Shooting Kabul: Second Thoughts

Shooting Kabul started off awfully sad... And I hate to say it.... It's not getting any happier. A little boy like Fadi shouldn't have to live with this kind of stress. He struggles everyday with the guilt of losing his sister as the rest of his family deals with the same emotional toll. Honestly it's a little heartbreaking. How he tries to get into the airport to fly back to Afghanistan. Of course he doesn't get away with it. He spends the next few days trying desperately trying to get into photography club so he could win tickets to India, a neighboring country to Afghanistan. Now, all he needs is the perfect photo to win the trip.
This book is so relevant to today's political issues. I can't imagine what those families are doing now, under the threat of deportation. Whole communities in the book are immigrants from the middle east and are dealing with racism and 911. While that may have died down  little since 2001, there is definitely still a huge stigma around immigrant and the middle eastern citizens of America.
While the book is heartbreaking, the novel sends an important message to the readers. Determination and hard work can get you anywhere. Or at least, If Fadi gets to Afghanistan again, that'll be the message. Here's hoping.

Shooting Kabul

I chose Shooting Kabul for the plotline described on the back cover. Fadi loses his grip on his little sister's hand as they escape from Afghanistan and returns years later to search for her. Well... I've read chapters 1-7 and haven't gotten to the searching part yet. Honestly, the book is really sad. That was to be expected, given the back cover. What I find most interesting though is learning about the Taliban. Learning something other than Taliban=Bad. It was really interesting to learn a sort of backstory into Afghanistan and the Taliban. It's cool to see another perspective, I find that most of the time the news is biased in some way, and of course the book is as well, but it's a different bias, and that's always interesting.
I think what I'll like most in this book will be set in the future, when Fadi is an adult. I love the idea of going back and searching, rediscovering the past. I'm not sure I've ever read a book like this before and I'm ready to read more already.

Secrets of the Universe: A love Story?

Was that a cute ending or what? I'm just gonna get my AWWWWWWWW out now because there are actually a lot of deeper issues here. (pretty sure this is that guy from Ferris Bueller's Day Off which is why I'm using it, even if he does look a bit sarcastic)

Okay. Now that that's out of the way, let me just say, this book was not what I expected... At all really.
I kind of expected a straight up love story. Maybe with a few problems of social acceptance or bullying, but this novel actually got a lot deeper. I wasn't expecting Ari's brother to play such a big role in the novel. He's not even introduced really, and yet Ari spends half the book wondering about him. Most of that time I was wishing for Ari to move on. I didn't fully understand why he couldn't go visit him or even just try to forget about him entirely.  Of course it all comes together in the end. Given how his brother was sent to prison, Ari's feelings of misplacement and emptiness make sense. His own brother committed a crime against someone who was gay. Like him. Maybe he knew it all along that he was gay, who knows really. To me though, it makes a lot of sense.
Another issue which becomes clear in the novel is the awkwardness between Ari and his father. To be honest I feel like it was resolved a little too cleanly to be realistic. Nonetheless, I didn't expect him to open up that much, if at all really. I think that's what I enjoyed most about the book. It surprised me. I was surprised that Ari and Dante weren't immediately dating, and that it took till the last page to get Ari to admit he was gay. Moreover, the genre surprised me. This wasn't really a romance novel at all, but more of a coming of age story. And I'm actually okay with that.

Secrets of the Universe: Not So Secret Anymore

What I find most interesting about this novel is the self-exploration. It isn't something I tend to think about a lot, as I'm straight and never had to worry about being socially accepted. Dnnte's journey of realizing he's gay was surprising to me. I guess I hear more of "I've always known" stories than I do of exploration around puberty. This isn't to say that either is better than the other or that either is false, but I wonder; which is more common? How many teenagers struggle to realize who they are vs the struggle to how others who they know they are? Does that make sense?

What I mean to say is this. Dante has discovered that he is gay. He doesn't seem to have known it prior to meeting Ari or even shortly afterwards. Ari on the other hand is lost. He wants to know what happened to his brother and who he is. He shut out from his father and is left with no male presence in his life to guide him at all. This is probably why he's so lost. Dante has a father who is open with his love and kisses on the cheek, he's accepting and Dante trusts him. He is free to experiment and find himself knowing that his parents will love him anyways. Ari is only 16, he's just starting to wonder about kissing and girls. I don't think it has occurred to him to think about boys. He's fallen in love without realizing it, probably because he was raised to keep his feelings in like his own father has.
I like that it's realistic. I love that I can feel what Ari feels through the writing. It's agnsty and confusing and pretty much exactly what being a teenager is. It does what it's meant to and I love it.

Dante and Aristotle Discover the Secrets of The Universe

Having reading the article assigned to us before starting the novel, I have to say I was a little irritated. Maybe I'm being a little too sensitive and maybe the author made the choice for a completely different reason, but either way I was a little mad.  I read the back of the book before starting and it didn't sound to me as if it was a romance novel. Now, I don't have a problem with this in general but I really, really, really hope it wasn't because it's supposed to be hidden. I know it's sort of implied, I just... I don't know. I want it to not be afraid to slap me in the face with it. I wan't it to say that this book is about a gay couple. I WANNA SEE THE RAINBOW FLAG FLY!
I mean, all things aside, once I started reading, I understood a bit more. What Dante and Ari have is a very subtle sort of love and it goes along with the summary. I just don't want anyone to ever have to hide that. Not in a movie, not on social media, or a book. .....Yeah I'm definitely overthinking this.
Whatever the back of the book says, I'm enjoying it so far. God knows what happens after page 107, frankly I'm not thrilled that we had to stop there. I might have finished the book last night if I could have.  I like that the two characters learn from one another. That they each feel distant from the world. It's the perfect blend of teenage angst and awkward romance. I'm already excited to read more.