A SPLINTERING

A Pakistani woman demands money and independence—and it comes at a cost.

“I am what some call an unrelatable character, and I have done something unthinkable,” Tara, the narrator of Amna’s novel—set from the late 1980s to the early 21st century—tells the reader. “But I implore you to listen. As the storyteller, I need you on my side. And we know that a story is only as good as its beginning. So let my story begin with rage.” Tara has reason to be angry. She endured a childhood living under the shadow of her cruel brother, Lateef, in the fictional Pakistani town of Mazinagar, and thought she could escape by marrying an accountant, Hamad, and moving in with him and his family in the city of Rawalpindi, where she would be free of the “darkness and filth” she came from. But she strains under the yoke of her overbearing mother-in-law, and convinces Hamad to move with her to a new house, which she helps pay for with her wages as an art teacher. But she becomes jealous of the wealth of the mothers at her school: “Of course it was a performance; that was what made it impressive. I wanted that performance, that way of holding oneself in the world. I wanted it with a longing that threatened to drown me.” Tara finds another gig: one that would destroy her life if her brother found out about it, but one that brings in steady money. Tara is an unforgettable character, seething, stubborn, and self-aware, demanding independence in a society that very much does not want to give it to her. Amna’s writing is gorgeous, and she does an excellent job pinning Tara’s story to events in recent Pakistani history. This is a remarkably bold novel from an undeniable talent.

A fiery novel about a character who wants more than just a room of her own.