What do you think?
Rate this book
The Gift
This tender Islamic love story is set in exotic Malaysia. The Gift is a story about a mother's last wish for her son - a new love and a new life. Her efforts open old wounds and unresolved pasts that are overdue for healing. The gift that comes from a mother's heart brings two people's hearts together while their memories of a mother's love lives with them forever.
- GenresIslam
292 pages, Paperback
First published March 26, 2009
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
June 4, 2018
This is yet another book on the subject of marriage! I don't know how many novels on this subject it is going to take for me to get tired of it, but as long as they differ in their approach, I can deal with it ;)
I liked learning about a different (Malay) culture from The Gift. The glossary in the back was helpful for this! I don't think all Malaysians think like the author or the characters in the book, so with regards to matchmaking/ arranged marriages vs. finding someone yourself, there was a lot of ideas going on. One thing that I didn't really like was how it seemed okay in the book for someone to get to know another for marriage and even fall in love before marriage despite there being certain conditions. I think this idea will give some people the wrong idea of what is acceptable or not in Islam. Now I'm not saying I'm all for arranged marriages because there are A LOT of things that can go wrong, but how someone approaches finding their own spouse should be thought about carefully...
While it is normal and encouraged for people to change and grow in life, especially characters in a book, I kind of found it hypocritical for some characters to be practicing in certain aspects of Islam, but lacking in other areas, for example in the above case of finding a spouse by oneself. But I guess that is the journey of life ;) We all make mistakes and should try to learn from them just like Imran and Syakirah. Some of the verses/ hadiths throughout the book also felt like they came out of nowhere and didn't flow with the surrounding text. Of course these brought the Islamic perspective related to what was going on in the novel, but I think they could have been incorporated more naturally.
What stood out to me the most in The Gift was the decision two characters made about getting married for someone else's happiness. This seemed like more of the motive at first and the characters eventually learned to love each other despite both being against matchmaking/ arranged marriages. The choice of what one would do in such a case was in mind for a while. Even if not in a similar situation, would YOU agree to marry someone (a "said to be" practicing Muslim) you didn’t really know just to make your parent's happy, family friend, or someone about to die??? I could say a lot more about this, but will leave this thought as something for us all to think about (for the future)…
I recommend this book to Muslims, Muslim Malaysians (to check to see if some aspects of the novel are part of the Malay culture or just the author's interpretation/ experience), readers looking for something different/ in an exotic part of the world, or those who want to read more novels dealing with marriage ;)
I liked learning about a different (Malay) culture from The Gift. The glossary in the back was helpful for this! I don't think all Malaysians think like the author or the characters in the book, so with regards to matchmaking/ arranged marriages vs. finding someone yourself, there was a lot of ideas going on. One thing that I didn't really like was how it seemed okay in the book for someone to get to know another for marriage and even fall in love before marriage despite there being certain conditions. I think this idea will give some people the wrong idea of what is acceptable or not in Islam. Now I'm not saying I'm all for arranged marriages because there are A LOT of things that can go wrong, but how someone approaches finding their own spouse should be thought about carefully...
While it is normal and encouraged for people to change and grow in life, especially characters in a book, I kind of found it hypocritical for some characters to be practicing in certain aspects of Islam, but lacking in other areas, for example in the above case of finding a spouse by oneself. But I guess that is the journey of life ;) We all make mistakes and should try to learn from them just like Imran and Syakirah. Some of the verses/ hadiths throughout the book also felt like they came out of nowhere and didn't flow with the surrounding text. Of course these brought the Islamic perspective related to what was going on in the novel, but I think they could have been incorporated more naturally.
What stood out to me the most in The Gift was the decision two characters made about getting married for someone else's happiness. This seemed like more of the motive at first and the characters eventually learned to love each other despite both being against matchmaking/ arranged marriages. The choice of what one would do in such a case was in mind for a while. Even if not in a similar situation, would YOU agree to marry someone (a "said to be" practicing Muslim) you didn’t really know just to make your parent's happy, family friend, or someone about to die??? I could say a lot more about this, but will leave this thought as something for us all to think about (for the future)…
I recommend this book to Muslims, Muslim Malaysians (to check to see if some aspects of the novel are part of the Malay culture or just the author's interpretation/ experience), readers looking for something different/ in an exotic part of the world, or those who want to read more novels dealing with marriage ;)
September 27, 2009
glad to read a "halal" romance set in familiar places!
August 20, 2010
a quiet, simple love story, evocative of film religi...worth your time to read. good Islamic reminders, a very quick read--nice for a weekend, or short trip. I enjoyed it.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews