A PLACE for US by Fatima Farheen Mizra - India's 2nd Generation Siblings Assimilation in CA

Fatima Farheen Mizra (b US 1991) was raised by parents who immigrated from India to CA.  Mizra's long winded meandering contemporary saga is of a family of Indian heritage, Islamic faith & Muslim traditions.  Unquestioned traditions, faith & social decorums become questioned & adapted by the children of immigrants from India much to the dismay of their parents.  The father Rafiq & Layla had an arranged marriage.  They met only briefly before they wed and moved to CA.  Layla had never been far from her family's home in India.   Rafiq & Layla become immersed in their Muslim community in CA which revolves around the Mosque.  Mizra's melancholy & thoughtful novel is as much about family dynamics & dysfunction as it is about the assimilation of a 2nd generation.  The novel begins with the wedding of the oldest daughter, Hadia to a man she chose.  This is radical & defies a sacrosanct tradition.  The novel shifts chronologically between past & present where propriety & beliefs were omnipotent.  Huda is the 2nd daughter & Amar, the favored male child.   The narration comes through all 5 voices and the perspectives are an eye opening emotional coaster ride.  Rafiq & Layla accepted their Islamic faith as habit, a way of living steadfastly held.  Men & women were kept apart at worship & at all social gatherings.  The siblings were able to look beyond limits of propriety that their parents could not.  A teenage Amar falls in love with the daughter of a family from their religious community.  Still, this is scandalous beyond acceptance.  The repercussions of coercing an end to their platonic young relationship have crushing consequences for Amar & his family.  A PLACE for US becomes repetitive & uneventful in too many places.  However, there are situations of poetic beauty, familial love and ephiphanies that fill the pages with a shimmering richness & tenderness.  Rafiq regrets his strict parenting of Amar that cost his son's love.  Layla too has regrets regarding her son.  How were they to know the moments that would define them? Hadia & Hudu don't abandon their Muslim heritage nor do they embrace it with the unwavering fervor of their parents.  Neither sister will submit to obsolete restrictions.  Amar & his sisters discover life on their own terms.  For Amar it struck him like a blow that his sisters never experienced doubts in their certainty of being Muslim or of a heaven or hell. "Maybe they had all gotten it right in their own way, which meant that no way was superior to any other."  Rafiq observes each generation losing touch bit by bit.  He wonders if for his children's children, would there even be a point for adhering to their ancestral heritage.   Yet Rafiq perceives "how miraculous it is that we receive in this world the very things we need from it."