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American Fever
WINNER OF THE ASIAN/PACIFIC AMERICAN AWARD FOR LITERATURE
USA Today Best books of August
Christian Science Monitor Ten Best Books of August
The Millions Most Anticipated Books of 2022
Harper's Bazaar Must-Read Books of August 2022
Debuts of the Season by Vogue India
Bustle Most Anticipated Books of August 2022
"A funny and affecting novel...a wonderful new spin on the coming-of-age story. A smart, charming debut." (Kirkus, starred review)
"A fascinating mix of immigrant tale, coming-of-age narrative, and cultural exposition...tackling some of the big migration questions of home and identity." (Booklist)"Dur E Aziz Amna has written an extraordinary coming-of-age story showcasing the experiences of a Pakistani Muslim girl coming to America. The novel uses brilliant storytelling to immerse readers and sheds light on the realities of what it is like being a foreigner living in a rural American town and the harsh emotional tension it entails."—From the citation for the Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature
“This is a fearless, exacting, essential work, and marks the debut of a thrilling new global voice.”—Peter Ho Davies, author of The Welsh Girl
On a year-long exchange program in rural Oregon, a Pakistani student, sixteen-year-old Hira, must swap Kashmiri chai for volleyball practice and try to understand why everyone around her seems to dislike Obama. A skeptically witty narrator, Hira finds herself stuck between worlds. The experience is memorable for reasons both good and bad; a first kiss, new friends, racism, Islamophobia, homesickness. Along the way Hira starts to feel increasingly unwell until she begins coughing up blood, and receives a diagnosis of tuberculosis, pushing her into quarantine and turning her newly established home away from home upside down.
American Fever is a compelling and laugh-out-loud funny novel about adolescence, family, otherness, religion, the push-and-pull of home. It marks the entrance on the international literary scene of the brilliant fresh voice of Dur e Aziz Amna.
USA Today Best books of August
Christian Science Monitor Ten Best Books of August
The Millions Most Anticipated Books of 2022
Harper's Bazaar Must-Read Books of August 2022
Debuts of the Season by Vogue India
Bustle Most Anticipated Books of August 2022
"A funny and affecting novel...a wonderful new spin on the coming-of-age story. A smart, charming debut." (Kirkus, starred review)
"A fascinating mix of immigrant tale, coming-of-age narrative, and cultural exposition...tackling some of the big migration questions of home and identity." (Booklist)"Dur E Aziz Amna has written an extraordinary coming-of-age story showcasing the experiences of a Pakistani Muslim girl coming to America. The novel uses brilliant storytelling to immerse readers and sheds light on the realities of what it is like being a foreigner living in a rural American town and the harsh emotional tension it entails."—From the citation for the Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature
“This is a fearless, exacting, essential work, and marks the debut of a thrilling new global voice.”—Peter Ho Davies, author of The Welsh Girl
On a year-long exchange program in rural Oregon, a Pakistani student, sixteen-year-old Hira, must swap Kashmiri chai for volleyball practice and try to understand why everyone around her seems to dislike Obama. A skeptically witty narrator, Hira finds herself stuck between worlds. The experience is memorable for reasons both good and bad; a first kiss, new friends, racism, Islamophobia, homesickness. Along the way Hira starts to feel increasingly unwell until she begins coughing up blood, and receives a diagnosis of tuberculosis, pushing her into quarantine and turning her newly established home away from home upside down.
American Fever is a compelling and laugh-out-loud funny novel about adolescence, family, otherness, religion, the push-and-pull of home. It marks the entrance on the international literary scene of the brilliant fresh voice of Dur e Aziz Amna.
288 pages, Kindle Edition
First published August 16, 2022
83 people are currently reading
5348 people want to read
About the author
Dur e Aziz Amna
3 books89 followersDur e Aziz Amna is from Rawalpindi, Pakistan. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, Financial Times, and Al Jazeera, among others. She won the 2021 Salam Award and the 2019 Financial Times / Bodley Head Essay Prize, and was longlisted for the 2020 Sunday Times Short Story Award. She graduated from Yale College and the Helen Zell Writers' Program at the University of Michigan. Her debut novel, AMERICAN FEVER, is forthcoming from Sceptre in the UK and Arcade in the US (August 2022).
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January 26, 2023
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3 ½ stars (rounded up)
My initial reaction upon finishing American Fever was something in the realm of ‘underwhelmed’. Yet, as weeks passed by my opinion changed. Maybe it’s because my mother read this after I did and we ended up talking about certain scenes and characters in a way that made it all the more vivid in my mind. Or maybe I just needed time to reconcile myself with the tone and direction of the story. Suffice it to say that the review I am now writing will be a lot more positive than the one I’d planned to write. While I am sure that some readers will be able to tell that this is a first novel, I believe that American Fever makes for a very promising and confident debut. Not only does it resist the usual coming-of-age character arch, but the narrative retains a certain ambivalence that really adds depth and nuance to the story.
The novel revolves around Hira, a 16-year-old Pakistani girl who in 2010 goes on a year-long exchange program, only to find herself in a small-town in Oregon. At first, Hira, a rather prickly and stubborn teen, is eager to leave her family behind and to refashion herself in America, the land of (supposed) opportunities. Hira buys into that tantalizing possibility of change offered by a new environment, but her ‘new’ life in rural Oregon is far from what she’d envisioned. First of all, there is the family she is staying with, Kelly and Amy, a single mother and her teen daughter. Kelly’s parenting is far from what Hira is accustomed to and she comes to resent what she perceives as a lack of care from Kelly. Because there seem to be no fixed mealtimes, and being used to food being prepared for her, Hira begins to lose weight. Additionally, Hira struggles to find places where she can buy halal meat. As Hira attempts to navigate Kelly’s ‘benign’ ignorance and Amy’s seeming disinterest, she also tries to familiarize herself with everyday American life. From their bathroom setups (after years in the uk i have returned to italy and boy did i miss bidets), to the way they interact with one another and so forth. At school, she is not necessarily ostracized but she mostly interacts with the only two other foreign students, Nicole, who is French, and Hamid, who is Omani. Hira and Hamid bond over their similar experiences with racism and islamophobia, although Hira soon finds out that they have quite different perspectives and attitudes when it comes to their peers and the notion of ‘fitting’ into American culture.
Hira is a character that is as sympathetic as she is aggravating. You feel for her sense of alienation, her longing for a different experience, and later on her homesickness. But she is also rather self-centered and entitled (at one point rebuking kelly for not cooking more). She is also an observer, someone who often seems at a remove from her surroundings, taking them in but not necessarily allowing herself to interact with them. Although her reflections on belonging, identity, and the notion of ‘assimilation’ are rendered with piercing clarity, a sense of ambivalence and unease permeates much of her narration. Concomitant to her initial desire to connect to others and America itself, is her unwillingness to ‘flatten’ herself or her culture to ‘fit’ in. Her self-divide is somewhat assuaged when she begins to fall for Ali, but, as the weeks go by Hira begins to feel increasingly unwell and, after she begins coughing up blood, is diagnosed with tuberculosis.
Dur e Aziz Amna’s American Fever will definitely appeal to fans of ambivalent narrators and stories following characters who leave one country for another, attempting perhaps to sever themselves from their past selves, like Charlotte Brontë and Jamaica Kincaid’s ‘Lucys’. Hira’s introspective quiet yet unyielding nature very much brought to mind Brontë and Jamaica's novels, respectively Villette and Lucy. Stylistically and thematically American Fever shares quite a lot with those two novels. From the cool-tone of the prose, to Hira’s occasional wryness and the awkward, occasionally tense, dialogues.
Hira’s journey resists conforming to the usual coming-of-age arc. Her lack of growth brought to mind Selin from Batuman's The Idiot. While it is questionable whether Hira has gained any maturity or a new outlook by the end of her narrative, she has not necessarily stayed the same Hira she was before going to Oregon. As much as she is misunderstood by others, she also makes assumptions about others, and all too often misreads other people. Yet Hira remains a deeply compelling narrator whose voice, frustrating as it may be, nevertheless held my attention. If you are liked releases such as Win Me Something & You Exist Too Much, and Days of Distraction you should consider adding this debut to your tbr.
American Fever presents its readers with a piercing interrogation of otherness and belonging that doubles as a quiet yet poignant meditation on adolescence, identity, and family. The narrative has a quiet almost slice-of-life feel that may bore readers who are looking for more plot-driven storytelling. But, if you are looking for a nuanced character study, look no further.
Some quotes to give you the vibe of this novel:
“There’s a strain of story this could fall into. The foreigner trying to fit in, hindered by accent and Fahrenheit and the Imperial system. The intelligent immigrant turned hapless by America. The outsider on the periphery of America. The entranced documenter of America. The truth— I was bloody bored. It is hard to overstate how much of an abstraction a new country remains to the foreigner, and for how long. America was a concept, and I was there to testify to it. It was metaphor, and not the thing itself. Nothing I did there had any material weight; nothing sated, nothing seeped.”
“History is what happens in other places. America transcends it.”
“Culture is so flattening when described for the outsider.”
“One of the things I miss least about adolescence is the stupefying entitlement it sanctions.”
“It’s important to note that the entire time I was in America, I peddled in one stereotype or another, taking succor in their confirmation . Americans were rural and ignorant, or they were urban and slightly less ignorant.”
“Why move if you do not wish for places to change you? But perhaps you leave to find out what doesn’t change, the discontent and itch that are constant. You move only to discover, amidst the waiting and the hoping, and the dashing of that hope, that there is only one place the boat will dock. Wherever you go, there you are.”
“Sometimes, while talking to Kelly, I stumbled around a sentence, unmoored by language. Even after the conversation had moved on, I remained unsteady, like I was riding a bike that had narrowly escaped a hedge.”
“That entire year, Hamid and I treated parts of our identity like my tuna sandwiches— packed in little boxes, to be retrieved only during these lunches.”
“Children are prone to exaggerating the cruelty of others, but there are times when one realizes the magnitude of someone’s unfairness only in adulthood.”
“For years after, this was the tightrope that mattered —either confirm a stereotype to smug Americans like Mrs Sinclair or defend norms that had troubled me all my life. Then I realized two things. One, that my parents had raised me a snob, and universal legibility was not necessary, or even desirable , to me. Two, that I found no pleasure in translating culture, in working towards a greater understanding between one pack of duffers and another.”
“To her, I was only an object of casual interest, an add-on to her daily life. And I didn’t help matters. Some people walk into friendships with open arms, and it’ll come as no surprise that I’m not one of those people. With Amy, too, I withheld. I kept a scale in my hands, always careful to be fair with her, but rarely kind.”
“What grated on me was Mrs Sinclair’s insistent knowledge— nothing more dangerous than an American who thinks she knows the world. Kelly sometimes asked naïve questions about Pakistan, but they were curious and sincere, conscious of the place of unknowing they came from. This hag, on the other hand, was chewing up random facts gleaned over a telephone and throwing them at me as expertise.”
“My daughter is a brave girl,” he had said, his own voice cracking, because that was and will always be the central myth of our family. It is brave to leave.
“I knew the game. Culture and tradition looked best on a woman’s body.”
“In the coming days, it would strike me as an oddity, even a lack of imagination , how often my points of reference flitted to that other continent. I would tell myself to be more present, that not everything was a slanted version of that thing I remembered from home. I took it to be a frustrating sign of my newness in America, and not for what it was— the forever condition of anyone living away from the city, town, street she had known to be the world.”
“Did she still not know how it worked? He was a father. She was a mother. His errors and cruelties I would forget, or at least learn not to hold against him.”
“It is the sole landscape of dreams, the only place that will ever convince you that its failings, its bounties, its excesses, and caresses are all your own. After all, where does it end and you begin?”
“[B]ut above all the knowledge that we were all in it together— that giddy, intractable project of not being an adult.”
“One of the exquisite delusions of adolescence— the self-chosen life. In time, many of us realize how lofty an accomplishment it would be, to be only as terrible as our parents.”
“It pained me each time, because we are taught that independent women are heartless women, and who ever wanted that in a mother? It also thrilled the part of me that would take after her.”
3 ½ stars (rounded up)
“[W]e talked incessantly about the gap between here and there. With each articulated difference, we flattened ourselves and let American define us. We were only ever what it was not.”
My initial reaction upon finishing American Fever was something in the realm of ‘underwhelmed’. Yet, as weeks passed by my opinion changed. Maybe it’s because my mother read this after I did and we ended up talking about certain scenes and characters in a way that made it all the more vivid in my mind. Or maybe I just needed time to reconcile myself with the tone and direction of the story. Suffice it to say that the review I am now writing will be a lot more positive than the one I’d planned to write. While I am sure that some readers will be able to tell that this is a first novel, I believe that American Fever makes for a very promising and confident debut. Not only does it resist the usual coming-of-age character arch, but the narrative retains a certain ambivalence that really adds depth and nuance to the story.
“The newness of America beckoned. Kelly and Amy appeared crisp, like newly tailored clothes, the fact of them being strangers suddenly inviting. Abbu’s tyranny, Ammi’s coldness, Faisal’s petty concerns— I would leave them all behind. Because I was sixteen, and I thought one did that, could do that— leave anything behind.”
The novel revolves around Hira, a 16-year-old Pakistani girl who in 2010 goes on a year-long exchange program, only to find herself in a small-town in Oregon. At first, Hira, a rather prickly and stubborn teen, is eager to leave her family behind and to refashion herself in America, the land of (supposed) opportunities. Hira buys into that tantalizing possibility of change offered by a new environment, but her ‘new’ life in rural Oregon is far from what she’d envisioned. First of all, there is the family she is staying with, Kelly and Amy, a single mother and her teen daughter. Kelly’s parenting is far from what Hira is accustomed to and she comes to resent what she perceives as a lack of care from Kelly. Because there seem to be no fixed mealtimes, and being used to food being prepared for her, Hira begins to lose weight. Additionally, Hira struggles to find places where she can buy halal meat. As Hira attempts to navigate Kelly’s ‘benign’ ignorance and Amy’s seeming disinterest, she also tries to familiarize herself with everyday American life. From their bathroom setups (after years in the uk i have returned to italy and boy did i miss bidets), to the way they interact with one another and so forth. At school, she is not necessarily ostracized but she mostly interacts with the only two other foreign students, Nicole, who is French, and Hamid, who is Omani. Hira and Hamid bond over their similar experiences with racism and islamophobia, although Hira soon finds out that they have quite different perspectives and attitudes when it comes to their peers and the notion of ‘fitting’ into American culture.
Hira is a character that is as sympathetic as she is aggravating. You feel for her sense of alienation, her longing for a different experience, and later on her homesickness. But she is also rather self-centered and entitled (at one point rebuking kelly for not cooking more). She is also an observer, someone who often seems at a remove from her surroundings, taking them in but not necessarily allowing herself to interact with them. Although her reflections on belonging, identity, and the notion of ‘assimilation’ are rendered with piercing clarity, a sense of ambivalence and unease permeates much of her narration. Concomitant to her initial desire to connect to others and America itself, is her unwillingness to ‘flatten’ herself or her culture to ‘fit’ in. Her self-divide is somewhat assuaged when she begins to fall for Ali, but, as the weeks go by Hira begins to feel increasingly unwell and, after she begins coughing up blood, is diagnosed with tuberculosis.
Dur e Aziz Amna’s American Fever will definitely appeal to fans of ambivalent narrators and stories following characters who leave one country for another, attempting perhaps to sever themselves from their past selves, like Charlotte Brontë and Jamaica Kincaid’s ‘Lucys’. Hira’s introspective quiet yet unyielding nature very much brought to mind Brontë and Jamaica's novels, respectively Villette and Lucy. Stylistically and thematically American Fever shares quite a lot with those two novels. From the cool-tone of the prose, to Hira’s occasional wryness and the awkward, occasionally tense, dialogues.
Hira’s journey resists conforming to the usual coming-of-age arc. Her lack of growth brought to mind Selin from Batuman's The Idiot. While it is questionable whether Hira has gained any maturity or a new outlook by the end of her narrative, she has not necessarily stayed the same Hira she was before going to Oregon. As much as she is misunderstood by others, she also makes assumptions about others, and all too often misreads other people. Yet Hira remains a deeply compelling narrator whose voice, frustrating as it may be, nevertheless held my attention. If you are liked releases such as Win Me Something & You Exist Too Much, and Days of Distraction you should consider adding this debut to your tbr.
American Fever presents its readers with a piercing interrogation of otherness and belonging that doubles as a quiet yet poignant meditation on adolescence, identity, and family. The narrative has a quiet almost slice-of-life feel that may bore readers who are looking for more plot-driven storytelling. But, if you are looking for a nuanced character study, look no further.
Some quotes to give you the vibe of this novel:
“There’s a strain of story this could fall into. The foreigner trying to fit in, hindered by accent and Fahrenheit and the Imperial system. The intelligent immigrant turned hapless by America. The outsider on the periphery of America. The entranced documenter of America. The truth— I was bloody bored. It is hard to overstate how much of an abstraction a new country remains to the foreigner, and for how long. America was a concept, and I was there to testify to it. It was metaphor, and not the thing itself. Nothing I did there had any material weight; nothing sated, nothing seeped.”
“History is what happens in other places. America transcends it.”
“Culture is so flattening when described for the outsider.”
“One of the things I miss least about adolescence is the stupefying entitlement it sanctions.”
“It’s important to note that the entire time I was in America, I peddled in one stereotype or another, taking succor in their confirmation . Americans were rural and ignorant, or they were urban and slightly less ignorant.”
“Why move if you do not wish for places to change you? But perhaps you leave to find out what doesn’t change, the discontent and itch that are constant. You move only to discover, amidst the waiting and the hoping, and the dashing of that hope, that there is only one place the boat will dock. Wherever you go, there you are.”
“Sometimes, while talking to Kelly, I stumbled around a sentence, unmoored by language. Even after the conversation had moved on, I remained unsteady, like I was riding a bike that had narrowly escaped a hedge.”
“That entire year, Hamid and I treated parts of our identity like my tuna sandwiches— packed in little boxes, to be retrieved only during these lunches.”
“Children are prone to exaggerating the cruelty of others, but there are times when one realizes the magnitude of someone’s unfairness only in adulthood.”
“For years after, this was the tightrope that mattered —either confirm a stereotype to smug Americans like Mrs Sinclair or defend norms that had troubled me all my life. Then I realized two things. One, that my parents had raised me a snob, and universal legibility was not necessary, or even desirable , to me. Two, that I found no pleasure in translating culture, in working towards a greater understanding between one pack of duffers and another.”
“To her, I was only an object of casual interest, an add-on to her daily life. And I didn’t help matters. Some people walk into friendships with open arms, and it’ll come as no surprise that I’m not one of those people. With Amy, too, I withheld. I kept a scale in my hands, always careful to be fair with her, but rarely kind.”
“What grated on me was Mrs Sinclair’s insistent knowledge— nothing more dangerous than an American who thinks she knows the world. Kelly sometimes asked naïve questions about Pakistan, but they were curious and sincere, conscious of the place of unknowing they came from. This hag, on the other hand, was chewing up random facts gleaned over a telephone and throwing them at me as expertise.”
“My daughter is a brave girl,” he had said, his own voice cracking, because that was and will always be the central myth of our family. It is brave to leave.
“I knew the game. Culture and tradition looked best on a woman’s body.”
“In the coming days, it would strike me as an oddity, even a lack of imagination , how often my points of reference flitted to that other continent. I would tell myself to be more present, that not everything was a slanted version of that thing I remembered from home. I took it to be a frustrating sign of my newness in America, and not for what it was— the forever condition of anyone living away from the city, town, street she had known to be the world.”
“Did she still not know how it worked? He was a father. She was a mother. His errors and cruelties I would forget, or at least learn not to hold against him.”
“It is the sole landscape of dreams, the only place that will ever convince you that its failings, its bounties, its excesses, and caresses are all your own. After all, where does it end and you begin?”
“[B]ut above all the knowledge that we were all in it together— that giddy, intractable project of not being an adult.”
“One of the exquisite delusions of adolescence— the self-chosen life. In time, many of us realize how lofty an accomplishment it would be, to be only as terrible as our parents.”
“It pained me each time, because we are taught that independent women are heartless women, and who ever wanted that in a mother? It also thrilled the part of me that would take after her.”
January 27, 2023
3.5 stars. This is a strong debut from a talented novelist with a keen eye for social nuances and cross-cultural tensions. Hira, a 17-year-old from a privileged Pakistani family, spends a year as an exchange student in a rural Oregon high school, as part of a post-9/11 State Department-funded program to bring young adults from the Muslim world to the States as cultural ambassadors.
As a South Asian Muslim parachuting into an all-white working-class town of conservative churchgoers, she experiences subtle micro-aggressions and utter incomprehension. Homesick and disconnected from her peers, Hira approaches her new surroundings with caustic and self-lacerating wit, and her own orneriness and prickliness makes her a perceptive first-person narrator full of teenaged self-dramatization and under-confidence. She dodges all of the obvious clichéd East/West binaries as she (for example) compares her host mother Kelly's genial absence to her own mother's hovering over-involvement.
What forces Hira to grow up, and further isolates her from her host family and the whole town, is a diagnosis of tuberculosis, and her forced months of quarantine (this isn't a spoiler-- it's revealed on the first page). Sometimes the narrative energy flags, and some of Hira's first-person asides and ethnographic observations might have worked better in essay rather than fictional form.
Thanks to Arcade Books and Netgalley for providing me with an ARC of this in exchange for an honest, unbiased review.
As a South Asian Muslim parachuting into an all-white working-class town of conservative churchgoers, she experiences subtle micro-aggressions and utter incomprehension. Homesick and disconnected from her peers, Hira approaches her new surroundings with caustic and self-lacerating wit, and her own orneriness and prickliness makes her a perceptive first-person narrator full of teenaged self-dramatization and under-confidence. She dodges all of the obvious clichéd East/West binaries as she (for example) compares her host mother Kelly's genial absence to her own mother's hovering over-involvement.
What forces Hira to grow up, and further isolates her from her host family and the whole town, is a diagnosis of tuberculosis, and her forced months of quarantine (this isn't a spoiler-- it's revealed on the first page). Sometimes the narrative energy flags, and some of Hira's first-person asides and ethnographic observations might have worked better in essay rather than fictional form.
Thanks to Arcade Books and Netgalley for providing me with an ARC of this in exchange for an honest, unbiased review.
March 7, 2023
I received an ARC of American Fever on NetGalley courtesy of Dure herself, in exchange for a review. I will keep my thoughts brief for now (as I am working a longer book review): I really enjoyed reading the novel. To say that Dure has a knack for writing beautiful prose is an understatement; she put a lot of thought into crafting each and every sentence in the novel.
As for the protagonist, I don't understand why so many people are complaining about her. Yes, she was not an 'easy' or likeable person..... so? She is a teenager; of course she is frustrating! I am saving most of my thoughts about Hira for a longer review but I felt that her character was fleshed out very well and complicated in a way I could understand.
American Fever helped me overcome my reading slump. It is sharp, funny, and goes a long way in exhibiting Dure's ruminative and keenly observant style of writing. A must read!
As for the protagonist, I don't understand why so many people are complaining about her. Yes, she was not an 'easy' or likeable person..... so? She is a teenager; of course she is frustrating! I am saving most of my thoughts about Hira for a longer review but I felt that her character was fleshed out very well and complicated in a way I could understand.
American Fever helped me overcome my reading slump. It is sharp, funny, and goes a long way in exhibiting Dure's ruminative and keenly observant style of writing. A must read!
August 31, 2022
On Sunday I was talking to my mom’s friend’s daughter who finished her MFA in 2020, and she was saying that you could tell that books like Little Fires Everywhere and The Vanishing Half were made to be adapted for TV, and then I asked her what the difference is between books written to be adapted for TV and those that aren’t, and she said that the former are plot-based, more easily digestible, and less interior. Based on these criteria, this book was certainly not written to be adapted to TV. Things happen, but the most searing parts are Hira’s musings on Pakistan, America, what home means, and what it means to leave it. Nothing is easy in this book: not Hira’s relationship with her home family and country, not Hira’s relationship with her host family and country, and not even Hira herself. There are no easy answers about assimilation or migration or the best way to achieve them. The closest we come to something definite is the assertion that home stays with you and other places inevitably change you, and it’s a testament to the prose that this somehow feels both obvious and profound at the same time.
August 29, 2022
Hira, the protagonist in "American Fever", is a bright, opinionated 16 year old girl living with her parents and younger brother in Pakistan, circa 2010. Her parents (whom Hira calls Abbu and Ammi) are educated professionals. The family leads an upper class lifestyle, complete with their own daily maid and chauffeur. Abbu, in particular, is a devout Muslim. Hira attends a religious girls' high school.
The story involves Hira's being selected to be an exchange high school student in the U.S. She's matched with a family who lives in rural Oregon - far from NYC, which is where Hira would prefer to be. The American family consists of a single mother (Kelly - an ex-hippie) and her daughter (Amy) who is Hira's same age. Kelly attends a Christian evangelist church each Sunday. It is Kelly's idea to host an exchange student; Her daughter is ambivalent about having Hira in their household.
My reactions: I enjoyed reading about the characters' differing observations about each other and their cultures. This is fiction, but it felt so real that sometimes I felt as if I was reading Hira's memoir about being an exchange student. I especially like how the author portrayed the teens in the book. Hira, at times, could come across as prickly.
This is the author's debut novel. I'll be interested to read what she writes next.
The story involves Hira's being selected to be an exchange high school student in the U.S. She's matched with a family who lives in rural Oregon - far from NYC, which is where Hira would prefer to be. The American family consists of a single mother (Kelly - an ex-hippie) and her daughter (Amy) who is Hira's same age. Kelly attends a Christian evangelist church each Sunday. It is Kelly's idea to host an exchange student; Her daughter is ambivalent about having Hira in their household.
My reactions: I enjoyed reading about the characters' differing observations about each other and their cultures. This is fiction, but it felt so real that sometimes I felt as if I was reading Hira's memoir about being an exchange student. I especially like how the author portrayed the teens in the book. Hira, at times, could come across as prickly.
This is the author's debut novel. I'll be interested to read what she writes next.
August 21, 2022
So moved by it. So much sharply rendered felt in some vague visceral way but never articulated. So many sentences and passages underlined and filled with marginalia.
Perhaps if I had read it a few years ago when I had never left home I would have been irritated by the very premise of this novel: not another offering in English about America, please spare us. Aren’t there any stories at home that can be written by those living here, why do we always have to be fed ‘Pakistani’ stories from a diaspora lens? But if I had given it a chance even then, I would have seen how this book subverts and complicates those narratives. This is an anti-Jhumpa Lahiri trajectory. This is far less sentimental and thus way more clever. Bohat kamaal, Dure. Bohat dayr baad koi kitaab parh kar aansoo nikal aae.
Perhaps if I had read it a few years ago when I had never left home I would have been irritated by the very premise of this novel: not another offering in English about America, please spare us. Aren’t there any stories at home that can be written by those living here, why do we always have to be fed ‘Pakistani’ stories from a diaspora lens? But if I had given it a chance even then, I would have seen how this book subverts and complicates those narratives. This is an anti-Jhumpa Lahiri trajectory. This is far less sentimental and thus way more clever. Bohat kamaal, Dure. Bohat dayr baad koi kitaab parh kar aansoo nikal aae.
March 23, 2022
American Fever has earned itself a place on my future syllabi. This book was, by far, one of the most bitingly clear, beautifully written stories I've read in a long time. I've read a lot of criticism about Hira's voice and character, but so much cultural information is being conveyed through her life, actions, and words that I was overwhelmed with the sheer honesty of it all.
Being somewhere new, especially a place that is so grounded in self-love as the idealistic America is, cannot be easy for anyone. Being from Pakistan, especially during the time period that this book is set, well -- I can't even imagine. Thankfully, Dur e Aziz Amna does that for us and she is unapologetically honest and this American is thankful for it.
Beautifully written book. A must-read for every American. Don't pass this one up.
Being somewhere new, especially a place that is so grounded in self-love as the idealistic America is, cannot be easy for anyone. Being from Pakistan, especially during the time period that this book is set, well -- I can't even imagine. Thankfully, Dur e Aziz Amna does that for us and she is unapologetically honest and this American is thankful for it.
Beautifully written book. A must-read for every American. Don't pass this one up.
April 29, 2023
Hira gets a chance to go to rural Oregon, America, as part of her school's exchange program. She is super excited, knowing that not many people, especially girls, get the opportunity to go alone for such a long period of time. When she lands, she realizes that America is not as amazing as she had dreamt it to be - she has to make her own food, do her own chores, make new friends, and deal with racism and Islamophobia, all while being away from home.
Halfway through her trip, she starts feeling unwell, developing a cough that won't go away, and getting diagnosed with TB. When she is quarantined due to the contagious disease, her already chaotic life is upended even more. She starts missing her home and family, realizing that the American dream she had was just an illusion and her homeland is where she was meant to be all along.
This coming-of-age book is one of the few desi books that doesn't glorify the Western world with ooohs and aahs. On the other hand, it does not romanticize Pakistan either - Dur e Aziz has done a brilliant job of narrating a lot of hypocrisy that is rampant in both countries. I absolutely loved how it is not targeted towards the Western audience and is written for desis. It is realistic in terms of Hira's erratic and sometimes obnoxious behavior. It is dark, witty, and sad simultaneously with easy, fast-paced prose. The writing is poignant and has lots of sentences that you want to read over and over.
Halfway through her trip, she starts feeling unwell, developing a cough that won't go away, and getting diagnosed with TB. When she is quarantined due to the contagious disease, her already chaotic life is upended even more. She starts missing her home and family, realizing that the American dream she had was just an illusion and her homeland is where she was meant to be all along.
This coming-of-age book is one of the few desi books that doesn't glorify the Western world with ooohs and aahs. On the other hand, it does not romanticize Pakistan either - Dur e Aziz has done a brilliant job of narrating a lot of hypocrisy that is rampant in both countries. I absolutely loved how it is not targeted towards the Western audience and is written for desis. It is realistic in terms of Hira's erratic and sometimes obnoxious behavior. It is dark, witty, and sad simultaneously with easy, fast-paced prose. The writing is poignant and has lots of sentences that you want to read over and over.
January 10, 2023
2023 reads: 12/350
2023 tbr: 5/100
hira is an exchange student from pakistan currently living in rural oregon. from having to cook for herself to the cough that doesn’t seem to be going away, she has trouble adjusting to her new environment.
one of my reading goals this year was to read more literary fiction, so i’m glad this was recommended to me! though i’m not used to this genre and the style of writing it typically entails, i really enjoyed this book. this book is character-driven (i believe most, if not all, literary fiction novels are) and i found hira an interesting and sometimes relatable character. there were also a lot of quotes i really liked!
2023 tbr: 5/100
hira is an exchange student from pakistan currently living in rural oregon. from having to cook for herself to the cough that doesn’t seem to be going away, she has trouble adjusting to her new environment.
one of my reading goals this year was to read more literary fiction, so i’m glad this was recommended to me! though i’m not used to this genre and the style of writing it typically entails, i really enjoyed this book. this book is character-driven (i believe most, if not all, literary fiction novels are) and i found hira an interesting and sometimes relatable character. there were also a lot of quotes i really liked!
June 12, 2022
I received an ARC copy of American Fever through NetGalley.
On the surface, this story is about a Pakistani teenager who won an exchange student scholarship, destined for a small town on the Oregon coast. However, this novel takes on deeper topics like Islamophobia, assimilation, and the unexpected realities of culture shock. Our narrator, Hira, is an innately unlikeable character, with typical seventeen year-old folly. She is stubborn, arrogant, and simple comments evoke annoyance in her. However, a Tuberculosis diagnosis that quarantines her for months and the loss of a family member, forces her to see things through a different lens. While Hira doesn’t fully commit to the idea of assimilation (and is called out by her friend for not even trying to do so) she does soften to different aspects of her host town.
People who should NOT read this book: If you are sensitive and think the U.S. is the greatest place on Earth, this story may not be for you. It shines light on American prejudices to outsiders and the inherent belief that our country is the best country to live in. When Hira announces that she wants to go home, her host mother states “Why would you want to go there, when you could be here?” There is implicit (and often explicit) bias against Middle Eastern countries and practicing muslims, especially since September 11. This story does not hold back on this topic and even has a student in her high school calling an exchange student from Oman “Ahmed the terrorist.”
People who should read this book: Any one that loves a good coming-of-age story, thoughtful prose, and (bonus) have experienced culture shock and can empathize how difficult it can be to navigate a new country.
As a personal anecdote, I was recently in Saudi Arabia and was shocked (culture shocked!) that they did not use toilet paper. Similar to Hira, who arrived in America, and discovered they used toilet paper and didn’t “wash themselves” after using the toilet. It’s insightful to read a similar experience from the opposite perspective!
On the surface, this story is about a Pakistani teenager who won an exchange student scholarship, destined for a small town on the Oregon coast. However, this novel takes on deeper topics like Islamophobia, assimilation, and the unexpected realities of culture shock. Our narrator, Hira, is an innately unlikeable character, with typical seventeen year-old folly. She is stubborn, arrogant, and simple comments evoke annoyance in her. However, a Tuberculosis diagnosis that quarantines her for months and the loss of a family member, forces her to see things through a different lens. While Hira doesn’t fully commit to the idea of assimilation (and is called out by her friend for not even trying to do so) she does soften to different aspects of her host town.
People who should NOT read this book: If you are sensitive and think the U.S. is the greatest place on Earth, this story may not be for you. It shines light on American prejudices to outsiders and the inherent belief that our country is the best country to live in. When Hira announces that she wants to go home, her host mother states “Why would you want to go there, when you could be here?” There is implicit (and often explicit) bias against Middle Eastern countries and practicing muslims, especially since September 11. This story does not hold back on this topic and even has a student in her high school calling an exchange student from Oman “Ahmed the terrorist.”
People who should read this book: Any one that loves a good coming-of-age story, thoughtful prose, and (bonus) have experienced culture shock and can empathize how difficult it can be to navigate a new country.
As a personal anecdote, I was recently in Saudi Arabia and was shocked (culture shocked!) that they did not use toilet paper. Similar to Hira, who arrived in America, and discovered they used toilet paper and didn’t “wash themselves” after using the toilet. It’s insightful to read a similar experience from the opposite perspective!
July 12, 2022
As the child of immigrants, I recommend this book especially to others in diaspora to help understand the situations their relatives and friends experienced moving to the US. I learned of Dur e after one of her articles went viral a few years ago and her writing continues to be absolutely incredible. Furthermoe, her snarky humor in the book definitely made me laugh out loud a couple times :)
August 23, 2022
This book goes from wry observational comedy, “Everyone knew about America, the place that would upsell you on the thread count for your deathbed.” to absolute madlad lines like, “In time, many of us realize how lofty an accomplishment it would be, to be only as terrible as our parents.”
Great stuff.
Great stuff.
March 11, 2022
This review is based on an ARC of American Fever which I received courtesy of NetGalley and the publisher (Skyhorse Publishing, Arcade).
Before I start complaining, let me preface this review by saying that Dur e Aziz Amna is a good writer. The pacing, the alternation of timelines, the dialogue-to-narration ratio, the believable characters--these are all textbook good writing. That said, I detest the main character.
Listen, I'm an American Immigrant too, but Hira's petulant, curmudgeonly, arrogant attitude towards the country and culture had me feeling fiercely American™. We get it, you're homesick and too proud to say anything. You're disoriented in a foreign land and too scared to dip a toe into a culture you don't give a damn about. Not only that, there is no active character development. She learns nothing except in hindsight.
Hira wasn't the only one to get on my nerves. Her family (especially her mother and grandfather) are obnoxious, her love interests rude, and I sensed no connection between her and her "friends". But hey, maybe that's just a cultural difference that I don't comprehend.
Wait, why did I read this whole book? Can I have this rewritten from Amy's point of view? A coming-of-age about an only child whose single mom suddenly simultaneously marries a guy and adopts a grouchy Pakistani girl (who has a highly contagious disease), a girl who has to decide what she's going to do with her life while keeping up with volleyball, school, and the flavor of the week, Kyle.
Though I appreciate the good writing and interesting plot, I do not care for the end result.
POPSUGAR 2022 Reading Challenge: (Advanced) a book that features two languages
ATY 2022 Reading Challenge: a book with a language or nationality in the title
Before I start complaining, let me preface this review by saying that Dur e Aziz Amna is a good writer. The pacing, the alternation of timelines, the dialogue-to-narration ratio, the believable characters--these are all textbook good writing. That said, I detest the main character.
Listen, I'm an American Immigrant too, but Hira's petulant, curmudgeonly, arrogant attitude towards the country and culture had me feeling fiercely American™. We get it, you're homesick and too proud to say anything. You're disoriented in a foreign land and too scared to dip a toe into a culture you don't give a damn about. Not only that, there is no active character development. She learns nothing except in hindsight.
Hira wasn't the only one to get on my nerves. Her family (especially her mother and grandfather) are obnoxious, her love interests rude, and I sensed no connection between her and her "friends". But hey, maybe that's just a cultural difference that I don't comprehend.
Wait, why did I read this whole book? Can I have this rewritten from Amy's point of view? A coming-of-age about an only child whose single mom suddenly simultaneously marries a guy and adopts a grouchy Pakistani girl (who has a highly contagious disease), a girl who has to decide what she's going to do with her life while keeping up with volleyball, school, and the flavor of the week, Kyle.
Though I appreciate the good writing and interesting plot, I do not care for the end result.
POPSUGAR 2022 Reading Challenge: (Advanced) a book that features two languages
ATY 2022 Reading Challenge: a book with a language or nationality in the title
February 20, 2023
This isn't a review as much as it's a collection of thoughts I had while reading American Fever and want to preserve before my brain deletes them forever.
1. Dur e Aziz Amna writes very skillfully. The writerly urge to make every line a banger was def indulged tho for the most part, the lines landed and it wasn't cloying.
2. This is equally a story and a commentary on a very specific time tbh. being from the same generation as the writer, witnessing the war on terror and traversing internet spaces largely hostile/indifferent to Pakistan, I get it, I do. I'm here for it. there are a lot of references and pointed comments about American exceptionalism. But sometimes I chafed at why every instance had to be explained.
3. The narrator is also very critical when looking back and I was wondering why and I don't feel it ever becomes clear as to why Hira is so.
4. Uffff the ending. Uff.
5. I thought the switching between times was done really well and kudos to the author for talking about religion in a very factual and not mYsTiCaL way as much of post 9/11 Pakistani lit did.
None of these thoughts are indictments; I'm always wary of Pakistani English lit but this book doesn't deserve the caution. I mean, I finished this book in record time because it was that engrossing.
1. Dur e Aziz Amna writes very skillfully. The writerly urge to make every line a banger was def indulged tho for the most part, the lines landed and it wasn't cloying.
2. This is equally a story and a commentary on a very specific time tbh. being from the same generation as the writer, witnessing the war on terror and traversing internet spaces largely hostile/indifferent to Pakistan, I get it, I do. I'm here for it. there are a lot of references and pointed comments about American exceptionalism. But sometimes I chafed at why every instance had to be explained.
3. The narrator is also very critical when looking back and I was wondering why and I don't feel it ever becomes clear as to why Hira is so.
4. Uffff the ending. Uff.
5. I thought the switching between times was done really well and kudos to the author for talking about religion in a very factual and not mYsTiCaL way as much of post 9/11 Pakistani lit did.
None of these thoughts are indictments; I'm always wary of Pakistani English lit but this book doesn't deserve the caution. I mean, I finished this book in record time because it was that engrossing.
November 20, 2022
I reaaally enjoyed this book! It was not profound in any certain way, like The Kite Runner, or A Walk Across the Sun, but it was deep and beautiful in it’s own right. Hira was an exceptional protagonist, self-reflective in some of her flaws and bias, and unaware of others, maybe for an interesting read.
October 18, 2025
Intelligent and tender and sweet- a book that's all heart and the kind of south asian representation we all need more of.
January 30, 2023
Interesting story about a young Pakistani girl who comes to Oregon as an exchange student. She has difficulties adjusting to life in America and also has a health crisis.
June 2, 2022
4.5*
American Fever may be a coming of age story, but it’s also a story of homecoming and home-going, of carving out your own identity in the world through your experiences, history, and personal desires of who YOU want to be.
AMERICAN FEVER is about a 17-year-old Pakistani exchange student named Hira, but it’s told as a recounting from a clearly older Hira, so don’t expect Hira’s narration to sound like a teenager. Hira arrives in small town Oregon to stay with her host family, and encounters a whole lot of culture shock—but also learns bits and pieces about herself and how she treats the world.
Personally, my favorite thing about Hira is her arrogance. She looks down on the townspeople and even her host family as ignorant (which is true). She absolutely refuses to treat the U.S.—particularly her very white and small town America—as The Dream. It was refreshing to read through the lens of someone who wasn’t foolhardily enamored with “America” and all that it proclaims to be. Despite that, you can see how her time in Oregon has changed her, ever so slightly. Perhaps seeing other cultures and realities reveals to you the flaws of your own culture and history.
American Fever may be a coming of age story, but it’s also a story of homecoming and home-going, of carving out your own identity in the world through your experiences, history, and personal desires of who YOU want to be.
AMERICAN FEVER is about a 17-year-old Pakistani exchange student named Hira, but it’s told as a recounting from a clearly older Hira, so don’t expect Hira’s narration to sound like a teenager. Hira arrives in small town Oregon to stay with her host family, and encounters a whole lot of culture shock—but also learns bits and pieces about herself and how she treats the world.
Personally, my favorite thing about Hira is her arrogance. She looks down on the townspeople and even her host family as ignorant (which is true). She absolutely refuses to treat the U.S.—particularly her very white and small town America—as The Dream. It was refreshing to read through the lens of someone who wasn’t foolhardily enamored with “America” and all that it proclaims to be. Despite that, you can see how her time in Oregon has changed her, ever so slightly. Perhaps seeing other cultures and realities reveals to you the flaws of your own culture and history.
May 16, 2025
I did not expect this to hit home as hard as it did. As a Pakistani studying and living in the U.S. I feel like this book was written for me and about me. Hira is someone who yearns to escape her home and homeland but once she does she cant help but miss everything about it, especially the mundane. Even the positives about America annoy her to no end.
She adopts a negative mindset and closes herself off to American life and culture very early on. Even though she plays volleyball and goes to church, she is always looking at things through a critical lens. I found it endearing at first but later kind of annoying that a teenager instead of living in the moment would become pensive and analytical. However, the writer explained in one of her interviews that she is guilty of projecting her mature views on a younger version of herself.
Dur e Aziz Amna does a great job of describing nostalgia, melancholy and the constant dilemma that comes with being the eldest daughter in a brown household. Hira is also shown as an incredibly flawed human being who constantly needs a rude awakening to accept that fact. She can be judgmental, hypocritical, and egotistical but that’s what makes her human.
There were some aspects of Islam that I think the author misrepresented for example, Muslim women are not barred from praying when they’re on their period because they are impure but because they are already in physical pain and they’re granted a “period leave”. Despite all my gripes with the character and author I do think this novel will stay with me for a long time. Below are some favorite quotes that I would like to come back to:
-“I would tell myself to be more present, that not everything was a slanted version of that thing I remembered from home. I took it to be a frustrating sign of my newness in America, and not for what it was—the forever condition of anyone living away from the city, town, street she had known to be the world.”
-“In moving westward to that enormous country where great, shiny things supposedly happened, I, too, had lost color. And so, again, that old itch, for something beyond.”
-“Defending dysfunctionality as character is a singularly adult trait.”
-“Women are penalized for all the noticing we do. Something about us makes it very hard to forgive us.”
-“You don’t have to roam the earth so defensively. Your existence doesn’t require anyone else’s acknowledgement.”
She adopts a negative mindset and closes herself off to American life and culture very early on. Even though she plays volleyball and goes to church, she is always looking at things through a critical lens. I found it endearing at first but later kind of annoying that a teenager instead of living in the moment would become pensive and analytical. However, the writer explained in one of her interviews that she is guilty of projecting her mature views on a younger version of herself.
Dur e Aziz Amna does a great job of describing nostalgia, melancholy and the constant dilemma that comes with being the eldest daughter in a brown household. Hira is also shown as an incredibly flawed human being who constantly needs a rude awakening to accept that fact. She can be judgmental, hypocritical, and egotistical but that’s what makes her human.
There were some aspects of Islam that I think the author misrepresented for example, Muslim women are not barred from praying when they’re on their period because they are impure but because they are already in physical pain and they’re granted a “period leave”. Despite all my gripes with the character and author I do think this novel will stay with me for a long time. Below are some favorite quotes that I would like to come back to:
-“I would tell myself to be more present, that not everything was a slanted version of that thing I remembered from home. I took it to be a frustrating sign of my newness in America, and not for what it was—the forever condition of anyone living away from the city, town, street she had known to be the world.”
-“In moving westward to that enormous country where great, shiny things supposedly happened, I, too, had lost color. And so, again, that old itch, for something beyond.”
-“Defending dysfunctionality as character is a singularly adult trait.”
-“Women are penalized for all the noticing we do. Something about us makes it very hard to forgive us.”
-“You don’t have to roam the earth so defensively. Your existence doesn’t require anyone else’s acknowledgement.”
August 19, 2022
I loved this book. so so much. this is partly due to the cross-cultured story, but mainly due to dur e aziz amna’s absolutely beautiful writing. it was melancholy in parts, tender, brutal and surreal. it’s easy to read yet full of really incredible passages and prose. love. and for a story that has so many sad elements, I was also properly laughing throughout a lot of the book.
hira, our protagonist and storyteller, has become very quickly one of my favourite narrators of all time. she is equally witty, smart, strong and so observant. she’s grown beyond her years and she sees the world in such a perfectly honest and real lens. she is also quite harsh and can be unlikeable in parts, but generally I was always on her side.
dur e aziz amna’s mediations on race, ethnicity, religion and culture are spot on. a reminder that as idealistic the usa seems, on paper, it is not the home of the free and accepting for everyone, and that if you don’t fit the status quo, fitting in and moving is difficult. especially with the added pressure of the year this book is set (it’s a spoiler so I won’t mention).
all I can say is that if I was a teacher, this book would be required reading. loved it so much.
#gifted
🇵🇰🇵🇰🇵🇰
hira, our protagonist and storyteller, has become very quickly one of my favourite narrators of all time. she is equally witty, smart, strong and so observant. she’s grown beyond her years and she sees the world in such a perfectly honest and real lens. she is also quite harsh and can be unlikeable in parts, but generally I was always on her side.
dur e aziz amna’s mediations on race, ethnicity, religion and culture are spot on. a reminder that as idealistic the usa seems, on paper, it is not the home of the free and accepting for everyone, and that if you don’t fit the status quo, fitting in and moving is difficult. especially with the added pressure of the year this book is set (it’s a spoiler so I won’t mention).
all I can say is that if I was a teacher, this book would be required reading. loved it so much.
#gifted
🇵🇰🇵🇰🇵🇰
May 6, 2023
I really admired the literary writing style of this book. As a narrator, Hira shares very keen and wry observations about her life. I was really impressed to see the discussion of gender, culture, and religion with this being a stand-out: "the bar for being a good Muslim and a good Pakistani seemed much higher if you also happened to be a girl."
However, this book also made me feel uncomfortable in some ways. It made me think about the personal and the political. I am a decade older than Hira and just moved to the US for grad school, but missing the fervent need to explain and get my existence acknowledged - which could be a product of being an adult versus a teenager. However, it made me question the narrator's defensiveness and need to be resistant to assimilation versus my own experience and what motivates either of this responses. It also made me think about the timeframe of this story which might have caused this versus the timeframe being 2023.
Apart from that, the book has some very profound quotes. One that made me put my book down and deeply ache for my family back home was:
"Why didn't you do what you should have done?
Why did you let me go?
Why am I here?
Why are you not?"
However, this book also made me feel uncomfortable in some ways. It made me think about the personal and the political. I am a decade older than Hira and just moved to the US for grad school, but missing the fervent need to explain and get my existence acknowledged - which could be a product of being an adult versus a teenager. However, it made me question the narrator's defensiveness and need to be resistant to assimilation versus my own experience and what motivates either of this responses. It also made me think about the timeframe of this story which might have caused this versus the timeframe being 2023.
Apart from that, the book has some very profound quotes. One that made me put my book down and deeply ache for my family back home was:
"Why didn't you do what you should have done?
Why did you let me go?
Why am I here?
Why are you not?"
July 30, 2023
"There's a strain of story this could fall into. The foreigner trying to fit in, hindered by accent and Fahrenheit and the Imperial system. The intelligent immigrant turned hapless by America. The outsider on the periphery of America. The entranced documenter of America.
The truth—I was bloody bored."
I want to hold this book close and never let anyone else read it because it would feel too much like they were peering into my soul.
5 stars because this is the first book in months that I've absolutely devoured. It was such an easy read, but also so, so difficult because I felt a little too seen <3 I don't think it was a perfect book, but I have never read anything that explored experiences I relate to so accurately: the way Hira lives right off G.T. Road in Pindi. The way her parents think and behave. The way her grandfather checks the locks on all the doors and twists all the knobs on the stoves each night. The way a guard whistles in the street at night. The way the teachers at her all-girls private school police students' clothes and behavior. The silence of driving on US roads. The anticipatory grief of losing people she's left behind. The discomfort associated with visiting Pakistani families abroad. The complex feelings that accompany coming back. I'm not sure how Dur e Aziz Amna managed to capture the smallest intricacies of life at home and in the US, but she did it wonderfully. This is Pakistani fiction that doesn't sound stilted in the least—it's interspersed with Urdu and Punjabi phrases that fit right in, and you can hear how the conversations between Pakistani characters would translate to Urdu.
This book is also so so funny, and in a distinctly Pakistani way. Hira calls the rural town she's sent to the Chichawatni of America. Pakistani politics and pop culture are referenced without hasty over-explanations. People in both countries are called duffers. The list goes on.
There are also so many searing observations about being a girl, a woman, and a mother in this country that changed the way I think about my mother, the girls I went to school with, and my own experience of girlhood. The one I keep returning to, because I couldn't quite believe how close it hit to home and because it offered a new perspective that I think might transform how I view my own parents, is this:
"As always, Abbu was using her as his khalifa to dictate what I wore just the way he had told her, the year I turned ten, that I should start wearing a dupatta over my chest. And as always, I would forgive him much sooner than I forgave her.... He was a father. She was a mother. His errors and cruelties I would forget, or at least learn not to hold against him. His acts of love—the jasmine buds he collected in a porcelain plate on spring mornings, the omelet he made one lazy Sunday, the times he took us to the doctor in a dusty '96 Corolla—were vividly imprinted on my mind as the events that they were. Hers—the lonely vigil over the cot, kettles of heated water for our baths, corrected homework assignments, matching socks—were the constant offices of love, invisible and uncounted."
There is so much more to say about this book. I read it during over the span of the week I was returning home for the first time in over a year. I read it stuck in my dorm room waiting for a snowstorm to pass, and I read it while in transit, and I read it before going to sleep on a mattress on the floor of my parents' bedroom, unsure of what or where or who home was. American Fever made me realize that, from now on, home will forever be That Other Place, and that it is impossible to truly ever Leave anywhere. It might even help me come to terms with having to leave the second somewhere starts to feel like home, whatever that means.
I have so much more to say and not enough words to articulate how much this book meant to me. Some quotes:
"What else did I do in those arid weeks leading to departure, when everything—friends, habits, the curves of the mattress—threatened to soon become memory? For months and years after, I would try to grasp at that—what it looked like, the thing that was lost. I would chase after the texture of that time and place, zeroing in on that summer, when I knew only one home, had parents who had seen everything that had ever happened to me ... All these prelapsarian significances came later, though, because life is lived in one direction and understood in the other. In those days of summer dew ... it was just life happening the way it always had. It was the furniture of days."
"I didn't know this back then, but no one in the world would ever be as much like me as Rabia and the other girls I was leaving behind. No matter what we did or where we fled to, whether we had babies at twenty or became surgeons at thirty, we were all shaped by the dawn and dusk of the Potohar, its parched gullies and ridges, the tyranny of Pindi winters, chaat samosay, naan kabab, the gravel of the morning assembly loudspeaker, the acridity of the chemistry lab, but above all the knowledge that we were all in it together—that giddy, intractable project of not being an adult."
"I was missing a moment that had not yet passed, and knew, as one sometimes does, that I would clung forever to that scene beneath the tree.... What of tomorrow? Perhaps if you imagine a moment long enough, it begins to exist outside of time. The Chai is always pouring. The tree never dies. It is raining forever."
"Let me tell you one of my most dearly held orthodoxies—for anyone who leaves home, that becomes the most interesting story of their life."
"Women are penalized for all the noticing we do. Something about us makes it very hard to forgive us."
"Condolence is the last frontier of language."
"I wish to remain unmoving, still and static, as continents shift and rearrange themselves around me, as everything changes and nothing does."
August 21, 2022
Hira is in an exchange program and as I'm just starting this book.. Her experience is going as well as you can imagine for 2011. I'm hoping for some good experiences but as great as this country can be it can do a lot better with welcoming people from other countries and religions. Being fearful of a religion that billions of people practice cause a radical group of them are horrible is insane. It's like being scared of Christianity cause of the KKK.
I feel so bad that she has to cook and clean for herself cause her house mom is a single mom. I mean rude you signed up for the job.
It's true though we have so many chores, I wish having household help was an affordable thing, like daily cook and clean etc.
This book is definitely already outlining the huge differences in the cultures represented. And I'm getting second hand embarrassment for how she is being treated cause she deserves better than that. Like a house family that can use Google and be prepared for her arrival.
Thank you skyhorsepublishing and netgalley for the e-ARC for my honest and voluntary review.
I feel so bad that she has to cook and clean for herself cause her house mom is a single mom. I mean rude you signed up for the job.
It's true though we have so many chores, I wish having household help was an affordable thing, like daily cook and clean etc.
This book is definitely already outlining the huge differences in the cultures represented. And I'm getting second hand embarrassment for how she is being treated cause she deserves better than that. Like a house family that can use Google and be prepared for her arrival.
Thank you skyhorsepublishing and netgalley for the e-ARC for my honest and voluntary review.
September 7, 2023
An unforgettable coming of age about the struggle of being torn between nations and cultures. Filled with personality and insight, protagonist Hira navigates culture shock, family dynamics, and illness as a Pakistani exchange student in an American small town. This novel so accurately explores the ever changing kaleidoscope of America; it’s cruelty, it’s judgment, it’s diversity, it’s generosity, and it’s always colliding mix of the good, the bad, the ugly, and the unexpected. It is also an accurate meditation of the yearning to travel, to be detached from expectations, the subconscious want to both be exactly the picture and completely the opposite of the immigrant experience. This novel is reflective and insightful in such a nuanced and relatable way; we can see ourselves in Hira, we have known and loved Hira, understood and misjudged her. Touching and on point!
January 28, 2023
This was another randomly selected novel from the library shelf that absolutely blew me away with the truths woven into its pages. A rather simple story of an exchange program for a Pakistani girl in America, but full of complex musings on what home means, who we are in and outside of it, and how to build and receive community in a new place. I absolutely loved the narration and insight and found myself capturing quotes left and right. More than pleasantly surprised by both Hira and Dur E Aziz Amna. Worth the read for sure.
June 21, 2024
THis was just OK. The author has a lot of interesting insights on both the US and on Pakistan. It reads like a memoir. However I feel like there wasn't a lot of momentum (at one point, I was too busy to listen to a few days, and I realized I didn't even care if I picked it back up or not) and I wish the other characters outside the MC had more depth. I would consider reading this author again though, ultimately this just really read like a debut.
April 22, 2024
The prose is so unaffected, every word feels intentional and meaningful, this entire book was *chef’s kiss* (and I completed the whole thing in 12 hours, it was that good). And yes, I’m biased but this is one of few pakistani novels written in english that has good Pindi representation.
March 9, 2025
I really enjoyed this book. It challenged cultures in a light hearted way. I found the contrasts of East vs. west to be thought provoking as a child of immigrants.
November 28, 2022
Thanks to NetGalley for providing me with an ARC for this book.
4.5 stars
When I first started this book I didn't have high hopes, the female main character felt a bit pretentious and her views about Islam and womanhood in Pakistan were kind of Islamophobic and sexist. However, I couldn't be more wrong. Yes, at times her thoughts about womanhood, Islam, and the Middle East didn't agree with me but that just showed the complexity of her character. As a middle eastern Muslim woman myself, I know that none of us is perfect and we all struggle with balancing a world between the West and the East.
Our main character is a Pakistani girl who goes to the US for an exchange year at the start of the 2010s. The story follows her struggles of being a brown Muslim woman in the US when violence in the East is rampant and Obama is in lead.
There were so many books throughout this book where I felt so seen by her, whether it was about her faith, boys, class, or culture. For example, at one point she talks about the differences between being an upper class in a third world country vs middle class in a developed country and that is something that I frequently think about but never was able to put into words.
Another big point of the book was how she tried to escape a closed-off, conservative culture but still kept up with her own ways and refused to change in the US. While the US offered her large freedoms, she still refused to assimilate or integrate with the people at certain points. She loved that she could walk home at night or hold hands with Ali in public but missed people that looked like her, missed people speaking Urdu, and missed her own community.
It showed the advantages and disadvantages of living in a developed country. While she was free in so many ways, the people were xenophobic, islamophobic, racist, or just didn't understand her struggles and couldn't relate to her. While she encountered these problems, even though she herself was struggling with staying true to her beliefs, she never let another person be racist or xenophobic towards her and defended herself.
I think the book touched on a lot of problems foreigners face in other countries and the author put these problems and people's feelings in these situations into words perfectly. I truly believe this book has the potential to become a classic in the future.
4.5 stars
When I first started this book I didn't have high hopes, the female main character felt a bit pretentious and her views about Islam and womanhood in Pakistan were kind of Islamophobic and sexist. However, I couldn't be more wrong. Yes, at times her thoughts about womanhood, Islam, and the Middle East didn't agree with me but that just showed the complexity of her character. As a middle eastern Muslim woman myself, I know that none of us is perfect and we all struggle with balancing a world between the West and the East.
Our main character is a Pakistani girl who goes to the US for an exchange year at the start of the 2010s. The story follows her struggles of being a brown Muslim woman in the US when violence in the East is rampant and Obama is in lead.
There were so many books throughout this book where I felt so seen by her, whether it was about her faith, boys, class, or culture. For example, at one point she talks about the differences between being an upper class in a third world country vs middle class in a developed country and that is something that I frequently think about but never was able to put into words.
Another big point of the book was how she tried to escape a closed-off, conservative culture but still kept up with her own ways and refused to change in the US. While the US offered her large freedoms, she still refused to assimilate or integrate with the people at certain points. She loved that she could walk home at night or hold hands with Ali in public but missed people that looked like her, missed people speaking Urdu, and missed her own community.
It showed the advantages and disadvantages of living in a developed country. While she was free in so many ways, the people were xenophobic, islamophobic, racist, or just didn't understand her struggles and couldn't relate to her. While she encountered these problems, even though she herself was struggling with staying true to her beliefs, she never let another person be racist or xenophobic towards her and defended herself.
I think the book touched on a lot of problems foreigners face in other countries and the author put these problems and people's feelings in these situations into words perfectly. I truly believe this book has the potential to become a classic in the future.
Read
April 4, 2023When sixteen-year-old Pakistani student Hira is granted a place in a US State Department-sponsored exchange program for Muslim youths from Asia to study in America, she sees this as an opportunity to escape, for a little while, some of the attitudes and restrictions she regularly encounters in Pakistan. Unfortunately, to her mind, she's placed in a home in small town Oregon. Not only that, to her parents' concern, her host parent is a single mother with a teen and a dog, and while Kelly is friendly, she does not reassure Hira's parents that Hira will be able to live as a Muslim in this home.
Hira is welcomed into Kelly's home and develops relationships with her and her daughter Amy. And though things seem to be going reasonably well from Kelly's perspective, Hira keeps herself at a little distance from the pair, maintaining a certain arrogance and superiority over them and their lives. It's ironic, as Hira had wanted an escape from expectations of home, but then looks down on the differences she encounters. Then Hira is diagnosed with TB, which definitely strains her relationships in the town.
Hira is a little frustrating, even while she's funny and observant. Her push-pull relationship with the people and things she encounters in small town American life make for interesting reading. She experiences some bigotry, but also finds some friends.
Hira has to confront a lot of things during her time in the US. Though she likes and enjoys parts of US culture, and that of her own, she is at the same time frustrated by the expectations and restrictions from her family, her culture and her host culture. And some of the very things Hira was trying to escape from in her own culture are ironically the very things she ends up missing. This behaviour feels very familiar, having seen it in mine and many of my friends' parents.
This often manifests in Hira as angry, resentful or spiteful words, but it’s also a part of her being an adolescent, when one's behaviour can be frustratingly contradictory.
Over the many months she lives with Kelly and Amy, Hira ends up growing up a lot, but she's still a teen, and some of her observations can be fairly dramatic and self-centred.
A few parts of the book dragged a little, but this was still an enjoyable read.
Thank you to Netgalley and to Skyhorse Publishing for this book in exchange for my review.
Hira is welcomed into Kelly's home and develops relationships with her and her daughter Amy. And though things seem to be going reasonably well from Kelly's perspective, Hira keeps herself at a little distance from the pair, maintaining a certain arrogance and superiority over them and their lives. It's ironic, as Hira had wanted an escape from expectations of home, but then looks down on the differences she encounters. Then Hira is diagnosed with TB, which definitely strains her relationships in the town.
Hira is a little frustrating, even while she's funny and observant. Her push-pull relationship with the people and things she encounters in small town American life make for interesting reading. She experiences some bigotry, but also finds some friends.
Hira has to confront a lot of things during her time in the US. Though she likes and enjoys parts of US culture, and that of her own, she is at the same time frustrated by the expectations and restrictions from her family, her culture and her host culture. And some of the very things Hira was trying to escape from in her own culture are ironically the very things she ends up missing. This behaviour feels very familiar, having seen it in mine and many of my friends' parents.
This often manifests in Hira as angry, resentful or spiteful words, but it’s also a part of her being an adolescent, when one's behaviour can be frustratingly contradictory.
Over the many months she lives with Kelly and Amy, Hira ends up growing up a lot, but she's still a teen, and some of her observations can be fairly dramatic and self-centred.
A few parts of the book dragged a little, but this was still an enjoyable read.
Thank you to Netgalley and to Skyhorse Publishing for this book in exchange for my review.
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