A Very Large Expanse of Sea by Tahereh Mafi Book Review

    




Written by Tahereh Mafi

Published by HarperCollins in 2018

ISBN: 978-0062866561

Plot Summary: Shirin is a 16 year old Muslim woman who is tired of being stereotyped after 9/11. She is terrorized by people at her school and this causes her parents to move around to find somewhere that is more tolerant. Shirin finds a boyfriend at her new school and he is captain of the basketball team but that causes many issues with the school and his parents. Shirin feels pressured to break up with him.  After joining a breakdancing crew with her brother, Ocean learns about how the school has been treating Shirin and he punches the coach and gets back together with Shirin before her parents decide to move again at the end of the year. 

Critical Analysis: This book works through many aspects of life that people who are not in the minority probably won't be familiar with. The themes of racism, fear of peers, and how family influences lives are very apparent throughout the book. Shirin is an example of how to persevere through many trials and tribulations even when they aren't your own doing. Shirin was born in America but she is targeted because of the color of her skin and how she chooses to practice her faith. Shirin loves her country and tries to assimilate as best as she can through listening to music on her ipod and focusing her sights on college even though she does not give much credence to her studies in high school. 

The story is set in a very tumultuous time in history with it being 2002 right after the attacks on the world trade center. She feels the animosity of her peers so she builds a very tough exterior to keep those close to her at bay. When her hijab is taken off and she is photographed, she truly realizes what it means to have people hate you for what you believe and not who you are. The author weaves a tale that takes you on a major character arc and shows you that even though things seem to be very tough, there is always a brighter future if you keep your head up.  

Review: Kirkus

After attending three different high schools, Shirin’s used to finding her way in new places. Unlike her brother, Navid, she lies low, earbuds under her headscarf, ignoring all the racist comments thrown her way. Shirin doesn’t take all the bull of her white classmates and their racist ignorance. But two things make this new school different: break-dancing and Ocean, the white lab partner who seems to see beyond Iranian-American Shirin’s hijab. She can’t get Ocean off her mind: Although he annoys her with his constant questions and texts, which keep eating at her data limit, Ocean forces her to open up. She even takes him out to watch break-dance tournaments, the one diverse place in her life where she doesn’t feel alone in a crowd of whiteness. Shirin keeps waiting for Ocean to get bored or to realize that being with her could cost him his friends, his family, and potentially his basketball scholarship. But Ocean doesn’t seem to care about other people—what they think, how they act, or what they believe. Even so, their relationship threatens to upend the cultural norms of American suburbia. This gripping political romance takes readers into the life of a young Muslim woman trying to navigate high school with the entire world attacking her right to her body and her faith.

A moving coming-of-age narrative about the viciousness of Islamophobia and the unwavering power of love in post–9/11 America. (Fiction. 12-18)

Connection: Students can learn more about the persian culture and the Islamic faith to help work on being more understanding to others that are not necessarily the same as them. 

https://www.britannica.com/place/Iran/History

More Books by Tahereh Mafi 

Destroy Me (Shatter Me Book 1) ISBN 9780062208194

This Woven Kingdom (This Woven Kingdom, 1) ISBN 978-0062972453





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