By: Samira Ahmed
Published by: Soho Teen
Released on: January 16, 2018
Purchase from: Amazon | Barnes and Noble | Book Depository
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Rating: 4 stars
Source: Borrowed from library
A searing #OwnVoices coming-of-age debut in which an Indian-American Muslim teen confronts Islamophobia and a reality she can neither explain nor escape--perfect for fans of Angie Thomas, Jacqueline Woodson, and Adam Silvera.
American-born seventeen-year-old Maya Aziz is torn between worlds. There’s the proper one her parents expect for their good Indian daughter: attending a college close to their suburban Chicago home, and being paired off with an older Muslim boy her mom deems “suitable.” And then there is the world of her dreams: going to film school and living in New York City—and maybe (just maybe) pursuing a boy she’s known from afar since grade school, a boy who’s finally falling into her orbit at school.
There’s also the real world, beyond Maya’s control. In the aftermath of a horrific crime perpetrated hundreds of miles away, her life is turned upside down. The community she’s known since birth becomes unrecognizable; neighbors and classmates alike are consumed with fear, bigotry, and hatred. Ultimately, Maya must find the strength within to determine where she truly belongs.
As an immigrant kid, I had my fair share of being embarrassed by my old world parents, so I went into reading Love, Hate and Other Filters, expecting a certain type of story, but what I got was much more. I loved meeting Maya, the budding filmmaker, who's afraid to tell her parents of her dreams. I totally related to her, because in my culture being a doctor, engineer or maybe lawyer would've been acceptable. Liberal Arts majors were not. I so got Maya.
I even got the love triangle set-up. A nice Muslim boy that her parents approve of versus the American boy she finds interesting. But the part of the story that caught my attention (and upped the stakes) was how a Muslim family can survive prejudice when they share a last name with a suspect who commits a terror attack.
Special mention goes to how Samira wrote Maya's parents. Maybe it's because I'm a parent that I related to them. Maybe it's because they shared some of the same fears and dreams as my own immigrant parents did. I just loved how they were present in the story.
It's a much more serious story than Gloia Chao's American Panda or Sandhya Menon's When Dimple Met Rishi, but if you want to get a glimpse of what it's like to walk in Maya's shoes, balanced carefully between her ethnic parents' expecations and her own wishes to fit in, pick up Love, Hate and Other Filters. I promise that you will be immediately interested in both the characters and the plot.
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Aaack, love triangle. Not for me, haha. But the book do seem awesome and important. So glad you enjoyed it Sophie. <3 Lovely review :)
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