Diverse Books and What We Owe by Bonde

Recently, several of our librarians have been attending a Library Journal professional development class called Equity in Action: Taking Your Diversity and Inclusion Initiatives to the Next Level.  We are in the midst of conducting an Equity Audit on our fiction section, based in part on work done at Skokie Public Library and by the Cooperative Children’s Book Center (CCBC) at the University of Wisconsin. Initial results are fairly positive with good representation from lists like the CCBC’s 30 Multicultural Books Every Teen Should Know or School Library Journal’s 42 Diverse Must-Have YA Titles for Every Library.  I am looking forward to analyzing our own data in more detail over the next few weeks as well as participating in discussions about School Library Journal’s initial Diverse Books Survey and their Diversity, Cultural, Literacy Toolkit. I have also been reading books that offer a more diverse or #OwnVoices perspective and will be including those reviews here. 

To that point, WHAT WE OWE by Golnaz Hashemzadeh Bonde is a relatively quick but extraordinarily emotional read, particularly if you are a mother or a daughter. Bonde was born in Iran in 1983 and fled with her parents to Sweden. She builds on that personal experience since her novel tells a story of Nahid, both as a young woman in pre-revolutionary Iran living though the revolution and as a mature woman dealing with a cancer diagnosis in her country of refuge, Sweden.  Nahid is filled with anger, including towards her adult daughter, Aram (“Maybe pain moves in a circle. Maybe I caused her pain to avenge my own.”) and she comments frequently on the ability to survive versus just live. At one point, Nahid comments: “Right and wrong, it’s so hard to know which is which as the years go… Sometimes I wonder if right and wrong are even the opposite of each other, or just two ways of expressing the same thing.” Nahid speaks of luck, too, and readers will be contemplating the sacrifices that a refuge makes (freedom versus roots), wondering if they would prefer a relatively easy life filled with good luck or the opportunity to build resilience due to facing and overcoming bad luck. In an almost journal-like format, Nahid reflects upon her life and that of her family, including recently deceased husband Masood: “If only we’d cried together instead of letting the pain turn into a thorn between us, maybe our lives wouldn’t have turned out like this.  Maybe then we wouldn’t have been so alone.” 

Book groups, especially, will find much to discuss in WHAT WE OWE which received starred reviews from both Booklist (“a must-read”) and Kirkus (“a startling meditation on death, national identity, and motherhood”).

Darius the Great is Not OKAY by Adib Khorram

As we greet new students at the start of the school year, I am reading a new YA novel called DARIUS THE GREAT IS NOT OKAY by Adib Khorram which definitely makes me think about how difficult it can be to fit in, especially as a teen. Of course, this is especially true if, like Darius, you happen to be markedly different from classmates.  Darius calls himself a Fractured Persian, because his mother is from Iran, but his Dad is a white American. Darius is a frequent target for bullies at his school and from his own commentary it is possible to see that Darius struggles with social cues and with accepting his appearance since gaining some weight as a result of the anti-depressants he takes. The novel shares events as Darius and his family, including a much younger sister named Laleh, head to Tehran to be with his very ill grandfather. Once there, Darius experiences completely new aspects of his mother’s culture, plays soccer with other young men, including new friend Sohrab, and works at improving his relationship with his Dad. This is a story about learning to belong and coming of age to which readers will relate while also learning much about another place and religion. 

Khorram’s memorable debut received starred reviews from Kirkus, Publishers Weekly and School Library Journal (for grades 8 and up). With an uplifting message, DARIUS THE GREAT IS NOT OKAY also contains information on mental health resources like NAMI, ADAA, and the National Suicide Prevention Hotline (1-800-273-8255).

Song of a Captive Bird by Jasmin Darznik

SONG OF A CAPTIVE BIRD by Jasmin Darznik received starred reviews from Booklist and Library Journal. This debut novel definitely deserves attention and it will entertain, shock, and inform readers about the history of Iran and about the life of controversial poet Forugh Farrokhzad. Darznik herself was born in Tehran and uses Farrokhzad’s writings, films and interviews to illustrate her feminist spirit in this fictionalized account.  Farrokhzad’s loneliness and rebellious nature in the face of an oppressive society are evident throughout the book:  “‘Besooz o bezaaz’ went the timeworn injunction to brides.  Burn inwardly and accommodate.  If I told anyone my troubles, I would have been met with exactly this phrase.” Ultimately, Farrokhzad’s story is both sad and hopeful:

A day will come when your eyes

will smart at this painful song.

You’ll search for me in my words

And tell yourself: my mother,

That’s who she was.

                -from “A Poem for You”

     (Dedicated to my son, Kamyar, with hopes for the future)

Although Farrokhzad died young (just 32) in a car accident in 1967, her writing lives on and was banned in Iran for at least 10 years after the 1979 Revolution. SONG OF A CAPTIVE BIRD could be a very interesting book group title (publisher’s reading guide), especially given its feminist theme and many connections to other cultures and works like the poetry of Sylvia Plath and the current day Landays of Afghanistan.