She starts with her childhood as an Ahmadi Muslim in Pakistan, where her family had to hide to stay safe in the face of Islamic extremists.
The memoir moves mostly chronologically through Habib’s life.
(Two other Canadian examples I know are God in Pink by Hassan Namir and The Love and Lies of Rukhsana Ali by Sabina Khan the first is a novel about a gay Iraqi guy that won the Lambda award for gay fiction that year and the second is a YA novel about a lesbian Bangladeshi-American teen which I reviewed in Quill & Quire!) This is a super exciting and welcome addition to the LGBTQ canon which is still very much in need of diverse perspectives, i.e. Habib’s memoir is part of a growing literary collection (fiction and non-fiction) from queer Muslim perspectives. You might have also read her journalism in places like The Advocate and The Guardian. Samra Habib was a new name to me when the publisher sent me a copy of this book, but you might have heard of her photography project Just me and Allah, which features photos and short interviews with queer Muslims from around the world.
Subtitled “A Queer Muslim Memoir,” this book was one of those ones I devoured in a few short days and then felt sad when it was done, cursing myself for reading it so quickly. I am back from an unintended sabbatical from my blog to tell you about an amazing book that I read recently: We Have Always Been Hereby Samra Habib.
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