Mutmainah > Recent Status Updates

There's something in the water at the New Yorker - diligently researched, beautifully structured, and randomly, with prose about the Dakota prairies to rival Willa Cather. I'm also finding myself feeling nostalgic (thanks in large part to Deabornites) about a time where North American muslims were more deeply politically engaged but Ali is deconstructing my nostalgia.

I keep thinking of Purple Hibiscus as I’m reading this (high compliment). There’s something so transportive and tender about her prose, it’s like the essence of homesickness itself.

getting some mental stimulation and entertainment in equal turns, I need to up my diet of classics before my brain atrophies.

This is such a departure from her first book. That one made a big impression on me, this one has me feeling like I’d rather be reading the whole Dear Canada backlog

Love this bit - “We wanted love, and to be literate in love … We wanted heartbreak, but only enough that our hearts required no worse cure than languishing in bed with a tub of ice cream … We were afraid they would love us to our deaths and that, even in our deaths, they would consume us”

wild how she keeps killing momentum and ild how little she trusts the reader

Raising my blood pressure one chapter at a time

I’m starting to accept that Sofia Khan 2 wasn’t just an outlier, this author has a sadist streak

Irritation all around with this cast of characters

First Anne Tyler in 4 years. It’s coming home.

Hate hate the phrase ‘mother wound’ but here we are anyway. The ‘This American Life’ episode with Loftus and Nicole is never far from my mind so a character portrait has answered many questions (and raised a few more).

What a tragedy that this is Larsen 2/2

Worried the first few pages the regressive 90s racial politics would be hard to shake, instead this is so topical i feel like it sought me out for this particular moment. Not an annotator but i need a physical copy to tear up.

Even precocious children have their limits

“Mrs Roy taught me to be free then raged against my thoughts. She taught me to be free and raged against my freedom. She taught me to write and resented the author I became”

The introductory chapter hit me over the head - and she’s still going!