OF MEMORIES AND MIRAGES

Rafique’s literary novel traces interconnected lives in Pakistan.

In Karachi in the year 2017, university student Aasiya is involved with a young man named Ashfaq. Ashfaq is soon to leave Pakistan to study at George Washington University in the United States, and the two discuss their future in the friendly atmosphere of Salim’s Teashop. Salim has his own heartbreaking past: His wife, Nilofar, died in the 1970s. Life in Karachi has not always been easy for Salim, yet he, like so many, finds ways to carry on. Later in the narrative, the reader is transported back to 1947, when the horrors accompanying the time of Partition are manifold. Despite the violence, Suraiya and Iqbal (who will become Aasiya’s grandparents) manage to fall in love. Returning to the 2000s in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, the story follows a young man named Irfan as he journeys to Afghanistan to fight the Americans. Irfan is trained to kill, and though his enthusiasm for the fight will wane, he will never forget what he experiences. The novel runs the gamut from happy relationships to desert combat. The juxtapositions make for some compelling contradictions: If Irfan had been born at a different time, he probably would have not taken up the jihad—yet here we see him commit horrific violence. Not every development provides such food for thought, however. Salim, kind as he is, makes for dull copy. At one point he is nice to a young couple in need; the scene doesn’t convey much beyond the impression that Salim is kind (“He had no idea what compelled him to support it all, to help couples run away, to give them tea and food for free if they came in together”). Yet, taken altogether, the book illuminates the many circumstances that shape lives and relationships in this volatile region.

An inviting, if sometimes simplistic look at ties of love and war.