6/10, I was hoping that I would enjoy this interesting novel about an Australian girl trying to live her life despite prejudices but this didn't work out for me. The main character Amal was annoying to read at first due to her shouting at parents sometimes and being irresponsible by skipping school but eventually develops her character by not annoying people anymore and actually being responsible for a 16 year old which I liked however it wasn't enough to keep this story from becoming a slog. Amal starts off the story by transferring to a new school and wearing a hijab and at first she experienced discrimination from her peers but eventually got used to it and I only realised this book was set in 2002 which is 21 years ago now when it mentioned that the 2001 terrorist attacks were a year ago which was interesting. Once that part was done the whole book just didn't know where to go next so it turned into a story about Amal living her life and doing some leisure and other tasks as well as showing me some aspects of Islam that I already knew like the Quran, pilgrimages, rituals and events like Ramadan so that wasn't that enjoyable and I had to push through that part and hoped that it would get better; it did but only by a bit. In the end Amal reaches the end of her school year and she celebrates the end of Ramadan and that was essentially it however I didn't like her dialogue since she constantly made pop culture and religious references that probably wouldn't be said so that was unrealistic. If you like books about Australian culture pick this however there have been other books since that one you can try like Changing Gear by Scot Gardner. ( )

Honestly, this would have probably been a 3/5 except the narrator was bloody brilliant! This was a coming of age story, with a twist, in which the themes of identity (whether culture, self-image, external/internal) and community (familial, cultural, societal) are explored in a number of different ways. I enjoyed seeing how Amal grew but at times, the story seemed heavy-handed. The audio-recording was top-notch, and Rebecca Macauley did a fantastic job giving everybody their own unique voice (and accent, tone, timbre...). She really brought the story to life for me. ( )

Funny and thoughtful novel about a teen who decides to begin to wear a head scarf for religious reasons.

Book for muslim women which emphasize the struggles of a muslim women

Aaah, så fräsch och även så lärorik. ( )