Prejudice Complicates The Course Of Love In 'A Very Large Expanse Of Sea'
Tahereh Mafi's new novel follows a young Muslim teenager in the years just after 9/11, and what happens when a popular boy in her class falls for her — will she choose love, or self-preservation?
Given what's going on most days in the headlines, Tahereh Mafi's new novel A Very Large Expanse of Sea — longlisted for the National Book Award for Young People's Literature — feels resonant in its somber portrayal of Shirin, a 16-year-old Muslim girl making her way in post 9/11 America. It's a cerebral, impassioned, and zeitgeisty bildungsroman that follows two young people ahead of their time but trapped by a society that strips them of any real power.
Shirin and her family have moved
