Showing 1-2 out of 2 reviews.

• The main draw of this book for me was the fact that it is set in Sheffield, as I am from Sheffield myself. However, I was also interested in what makes someone become a suicide bomber.Imtiaz Raina is a young man whose father has recently died. He is married to a white woman and they have a young daughter together. When his father died, Imtiaz accompanied the body back to Pakistan and found himself being drawn into the fight. What interested me was his feeling of being home there, even though he was born in England, but yet he also felt that he still didn't quite belong anywhere.The story is told in a first person journal account by Imtiaz himself, as he goes back and relates how he met his wife and their life together, interspersed with his account of his time in Pakistan and a visit to Afghanistan.It's an interesting read, although I found myself getting a bit confused at times, mainly by the names used for mother, father etc. This is a minor point though as it soon became clear who he was referring to. I think Sunjeev Sahota could be an author to watch for the future. He's written about a very current, and very emotive subject, and has done it extremely well.

  4.00 out of 5

  nicx27

• Falls a bit short of the mark.This book didn't really gel for me. It was rather disjointed and seemed to lurch its way between being a memoir and a farewell to his family.In addition, I had a problem with Imtiaz's motivation for becoming a suicide bomber - he seemed more worried about belonging and being a part of something than actually convinced by the ideology of Islam. He preferred to listen to Islamic stories than to study the Koran, although he was very devout about attending the prayers.Imtiaz was born in Sheffield, of Pakistani parents. He studied in a British school and progressed to university, where he met Becca. When Becca fell pregnant they married and his daughter Noor was born. He seemed on course to live a normal life as husband and father, until his own father died and he travelled back to Pakistan with the body. There, in his desperation to belong, he got into a fundamentalist crowd and committed himself to the ultimate sacrifice.As my motivation for reading this book was to understand what drives a young man, with a wife and daughter, to kill himself and others for his cause, I was ultimately a bit disappointed. 3 1/2 stars from me and although I would try this author again, I wouldn't particularly recommend this book.

  3.50 out of 5

  DubaiReader

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