KHALED AND JAMILA

A Palestinian father and daughter share common experiences across decades.

The debut novel by Ameri, the founding director of the Arab American National Museum, opens in 1956 as Khaled, a bright and headstrong teenager, begins attending political rallies in his Palestinian hometown of Al-Bireh. This infuriates his father, who wants him to focus on his studies; to force the issue, Khaled is prompted to go to college overseas, at the University of Michigan. There, his defiance continues. He drinks alcohol, violating Muslim proscriptions; more seriously, he begins dating a white woman, Elizabeth, betraying the woman he promised to eventually marry back home. Fast forward to the ’80s, and Khaled and Elizabeth’s daughter, Jamila, is in a similar predicament: As she heads to college at Michigan State, her affections deepen for Ali, a Black childhood friend. Seemingly oblivious to their own history, Khaled and Elizabeth scheme to separate the young lovers in the hopes Jamila will marry a Palestinian man. Ameri is alert to the hypocrisies of racism and the anguish that many post-Nakba Palestinians experience at home and abroad; the novel’s strongest sections are set in Al-Bireh itself. But the overall narrative is disappointingly flat, hobbled by overly attenuated scenes—Khaled is browbeaten over one night of binge drinking to an absurd degree—and wooden dialogue. (“People here come in different colors and have different backgrounds. Not all Americans have blond hair and blue eyes, and they don’t all think alike, either.”) Ameri avoids dwelling too deeply on the particulars of Middle Eastern politics, but what’s left is a sentimental story about the heart wanting what it wants.

An overly earnest study of history and emotional inheritance.