"The Writing on my Forehead" is the story of Saira, a Muslim-American woman of Indian/ Pakistani descent. Saira grows up torn between the traditional expectations of a woman in her culture-- marriage and children-- and her own desires to be independent. As her life unfolds, Saira finds herself forging her own path in ways that her more traditional relatives do not always approve of. As she creates her life, she is also drawn into the stories of her family's past. The novel moves easily between past and present, and the author beautifully uses the family's stories to illustrate the idea that no matter where you go, your family and culture are always part of who you are. There are times when the plot twists are somewhat predictable, but even when you think you know what's coming next, the writing is completely engrossing and lyrical. There was never a moment that I felt like I was waiting for the "good part" with this book; it was utterly compelling from beginning to end. ( )

It took me a while to start enjoying “The Writing on My Forehead”. Though I realized this at the time, my copy gives me further proof in that the first marker I placed denoting something I wanted to comment on was on Page 71.

Until then, I hadn’t felt much from or about the character. The words and the story were interesting enough, but there wasn’t much…energy, or life behind them. And then finally,

“Something flickered in my mother’s eyes. Suddenly, the person I had though of as my biggest obstacle switched sides to become my biggest ally. The first sign of support came in the form of silence. That night, my mother offered no further argument against my going.”

Although it’s not the main character, young Saira Qadar that says these words, it is in this scene that it felt like she started to really think about things bigger than herself, started to realize what members of her family had experienced in their lives, started to understand that they had an impact on her life, on the choices she would face.

This book is story about the past and the future…letting go of one and making the decision to move into the other. Saira’s story seems mostly that of an observer…a passive one at first, and then one that moves into the stories and sometimes changes them irrevocably.

A character that enters her life much later on says it far better than I. “Fiction is truer than journalism, you ask? But journalism is based on facts. Facts. What could be truer than facts? Well, facts are often disparate and contradictory. Their complexity eludes our understanding. How to assimilate them – these unruly, misshapen entities? Journalists are reporters. Reporters are supposed to report. The temptation to do more than report is irresistible, however – all for a good cause, of course. To clarify, explain, contextualize – to help people understand what we ourselves do not.”

I love the idea of facts as “unruly, misshapen entities”. So often facts are portrayed as cold, unchangeable, set in stone. But facts, especially those about and within the lives of human beings, are rarely ever the same when seen through different eyes.

“In journalism, truth is too easily rendered irrelevant, subject to the design and construction of facts. In fiction, facts are irrelevant, subject to the storyteller’s quest for truth.”

Saira, as she moves through the lives of her grandparents, parents, relatives and the world beyond, experiences firsthand the great divide that can live between facts and truth. And as she does so, the emotion, the feeling behind her words is finally revealed.

“…in journalism, you have to maintain your distance. You can’t bear witness if your eyes are full of tears.”

That distance proves to be very difficult for Saira, especially when it comes to the big secret of the novel (that’s not a secret at ALL so it bothered me how carefully Haji was trying to write her way around it).

As Saira grows up, the facts she discovers come with a price. As she becomes more involved in the story that is her life, she starts to understand how sometimes it is impossible to make a choice that is right on all counts. Most choices are right for some people and once made, seem incredibly wrong to others.

“And is that not something you will regret? Later?” Her question was in the wrong tense. The answer I repressed was a bittersweet mixture of regret and remorse already realized, processed and assimilated into who I was. Later was not something I worried much about.”

By the end of the book, I cared a great deal for Saira, and although mine is a life very different from hers…I felt that I’d been shown a great many truths. There is some joy and a great deal of sorrow in this book, but in the end there is the story of a girl who becomes a woman…in a family and a world she may not completely understand, but is determined to experience . ( )

An involving depiction of a young Muslim-American woman growing up caught between two cultures and deciding on her life's path. Packs a bit too much in as far as experiences but well written and engrossing. Great details about Pakistani and Indian and Muslim culture. ( )

The Writing on my Forehead, by Nafisa Haji, is a gratifying and powerful debut novel by a talented new novelist. It is a splendid, stirring, cross-cultural tale with multifaceted psychological overtones. The book covers twelve years in the life of Saira Qader, an American of Indo-Pakistani heritage brought up in a traditional Muslim family—a family with many secrets. We enter the book at its end when the main character is introduced to us as a twenty-six-year-old woman in psychological turmoil, a woman tormented by recurring nightmares that the reader does not understand. We are drawn into the mystery of what is occurring, and are compelled to follow the story as it is metered out to us in chronological vignettes starting when Saira is fourteen years old.

Saira's story is the story of her family, their relations to each other, and to the country and culture of their birth. This is a family that has suffered and survived many divisions. The book chronicles those divisions and gives them heart-rending depth. The story is emotionally satisfying with an unexpected ending that haunts the readers for many days after the last page is turned.

The novel is written as if it were a memoir. I started the novel knowing full well that this was a fictional tale, but soon got caught up in the false reality of the memoir. This literary effect was so successful that, three-quarters way through the novel, there was a scene that caused me to turn back to the cover and assure myself that I was, indeed, reading a novel and not a true-life tale. In that part of the book, Saira asks her career journalist and novelist boyfriend to read and critique some of her creative writing. He returns with this backhanded praise. "You are a leech, Miss Saira. You have stolen the stories of your family and made them yours... You are too presumptuous, putting words in the mouths and feelings in the hearts of people that you have no way of knowing are accurate. Yet, you have done it in a way that seems to honor them, with such sympathy that I can almost forgive your literary hubris." As I read these words now for a second time, I am struck with how accurately they describe this work...as if the author was having fun with the reader and honestly critiquing her own novel. If so, Haji shows excellent insight into her own creation.

I am impressed by the author's writing style. It is fresh and vivid. She allows nothing to detract from the delicate methodical unfolding of the plot. Haji is a storyteller. Her prose manages to be elegant without drawing attention to itself—and that style suits this book very well.

I chair a contemporary literature book group and I plan to suggest that the group read this novel. The book leaves the reader with many unanswered questions. I am sure that our book group will enjoy reading this work, and that it will provide an excellent springboard for a fascinating group discussion. ( )

The Writing on My Forehead is a family history told from the perspective of Saira, a young woman who has grown up in LA and is the daughter of immigrants from India and Pakistan. The novel starts with Saira looking in on her young sleeping niece and then flashes back to Saira's own childhood. The novel then traces the next 30 years of Saira's life--from childhood to adulthood--and her struggles against the rigid Muslim and Indo-Pakistani traditions of her family. As Saira learns more about her family history, she is more set upon defying the traditions that surround her. By the time Saira has reached adulthood she is a successful journalist hiding a huge family secret that will blow up in the turbulent days following 9/11.

Nafisa Haji's writing in this novel is crisp and fluid--she moves easily from one topic to the next and her descriptions make the reader feel as though she is traveling Saira's life journey with her. Haji does a wonderful job of unfolding Saira's personal story and her family's larger story on parallel narrative threads. The interaction between the generations is wonderful, and you get a sense of the complicated task of growing up in a large interconnected family. The novel has wonderful pacing until the last 50 pages, when it feels like the novel is rushed to the end. I wish the author had spent more time with the conclusion of the story, because it was so rich, I reached the end wanting more.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book. If you enjoyed The Kite Runner or The Namesake, you will enjoy this book. ( )