Hi, Saadia! Tell us a bit about yourself!
Hello! I’m a Pakistani American author and interfaith activist, and I write for both adults and kids. I’m probably best known for the YASMIN series, which is an early reader series for young children. I’ve also published two middle grade novels in 2020, A PLACE AT THE TABLE (co-written with Laura Shovan) and A THOUSAND QUESTIONS. I currently live in Texas with my family.
When did you first discover your love for writing (and writing children’s books, specifically!)?
I’ve loved writing since I was in elementary school in Pakistan. I can’t pinpoint the exact moment that I discovered I was a storyteller, but it’s been a part of me for as long as I can remember. I never thought I’d make it my profession, though. South Asian parents tend to push their kids towards more serious careers like medicine or business, so writing was never a career choice for me. It was only when I migrated to the U.S, and became a mom, that I realized how white children’s books in the U.S. were. I wanted my kids to see themselves in the books they read, and to be the heroes of their stories, so I decided to write the Yasmin series.
Your new middle-grade novel, A Thousand Questions, is out now! If you could only describe it in five words, what would they be?
That’s a difficult question for a writer, because we tend to use A LOT of words to describe every little thing! I’d say A Thousand Questions is about Finding Family in Unlikely Places.
Now tell us a little more! What can readers expect?
This is a story about two middle school girls who couldn’t be more different from each other if they tried. Mimi is a Pakistani American (like my own kids) who’s got no connection with her ancestors’ homeland. One summer, she’s dragged to visit her grandparents in Pakistan and expects everything to be horrible. Then she meets the cook’s daughter, Sakina, who’s her age but much wiser and disillusioned because of the hard life she’s lived. The two girls have impossible dreams – Mimi to find her long-absent journalist father, and Sakina to pass an English test so she can go to school – and they realize that by working together they can help each other achieve those dreams. During the course of the summer, Mimi and Sakina discover family, friendship and a beautiful Pakistan.
What inspired you to write this novel?
A few years ago I, like Mimi’s mother, dragged my kids to Pakistan to visit my family. Once there, I saw them go through a range of emotions and experiences. They hated some aspects of the place, but loved others. I think for the first time, they could feel connected to something in a way that they probably had never felt in the U.S. Their reactions were also very different from what I myself felt, because for me it was a homecoming whereas for them it was a revelation. That trip became the inspiration for A Thousand Questions.
Did the character arcs of Sakina and Mimi change throughout your drafting process, or did they turn out exactly how you imagined in the beginning?
I’m the kind of writer who doesn’t enjoy revising, so I try to make my first draft really clean. I do intensive outlining before I ever put my hands on the keyboard, and really think hard about what’s going to happen to each character, not just the main ones. I knew when I started what both of these girls’ stories would be, and how they would each find their paths during the book. The same goes for the secondary characters, such as Mimi’s mom and grandparents, and Sakina’s father.
The cover for A Thousand Questions is so beautiful, do you have any cool tidbits about the background or cover-creating process?
Thank you, I just adore the cover by artist Aaliya Jaleel! I wasn’t involved in the art process at all, so it came as a complete surprise to me. Having two brown girls on the cover, proud and confident, is a huge deal for someone who grew up never seeing herself on the cover of an English book. Even more stunning is the background, because it includes actual buildings in Karachi in silhouette. They’re the buildings I’d see every day on the way to school or visiting family on weekends. There’s even the cathedral that stood outside my convent school. This cover is so special to me, just like this book is, because it’s got so much of my essence and memories within it.
What do you hope readers will take away from reading A Thousand Questions?
My goal with this book was to explore what happens when first generation kids arrive in the motherland, how they cope with language and cultural barriers while essentially being “the same” as those who live there. I wanted kids like mine to read this book and find a little bit of their own conflicted emotions of being “neither here nor there” on the page. At the same time, I also wanted to highlight how incredible my birthplace of Karachi, Pakistan is. There are a lot of readers in the west who think of third world countries as horrible places, full of poverty and violence. I wanted to remove those misconceptions by showcasing the city I grew up in and the people who are a part of my heritage.
What’s next for you?
I’m working on several other books right now. Of course, the YASMIN series is ongoing, with new titles released in January 2021, and in 2022. There’s also my next middle grade novel YUSUF AZEEM IS NOT A HERO which is a 9/11 book from a Muslim family’s viewpoint. It’s told in dual perspective twenty years apart so that readers can see how the after-effects of the 9/11 attacks still reverberate in our society today.
Lastly, are you currently reading anything and do you have any book recommendations for our readers?
I read a lot of children’s books, and my current favorite is MY NAME IS A SONG by Jamilah Thompkins-Bigelow. I think everybody should read it. And in adult books I highly recommend THE BEAUTY OF YOUR FACE by Sahar Mustafah.
