I have been thinking a lot about Between Two Moons by Aisha Abdel Gawad lately, especially given that we are entering 9 months of a genocide that is being broadcasted live but NOTHING is being done to bring it to an end. I want to write a thoughtful piece that can explain why the world is so eager to dehumanize us, but I cannot seem to find the words.
But Aisha Abdel Gawad did. In her debut novel, an unforgettable coming-of-age story about what is like to grow up as an immigrant Muslim girl, she captures the realities of Arab and Muslim communities in the most authentic ways. If you haven’t already picked up this book, here are some reasons why you should read Between Two Moons by Aisha Abdel Gawad.
8 Reasons You Should Read Between Two Moons by Aisha Abdel Gawad
A little context before I get started: Between Two Moons by Aisha Abdel Gawad is a young adult, contemporary coming-of-age novel about twin sisters Amira and Lina, who are about to graduate and are excited to make their last summer before college a truly memorable one. But then a raid on a local business leads to a protest that brings the entire Arab communities together, and Amira and Lina’s older brother Sami unexpectedly and mysteriously return from prison soon after. Tensions soar in the community after a terrible hate crime, and Amira cannot help but suspect that her brother has returned for the wrong reasons.
1. The Representation Of Flawed Muslim Characters
Although every religion has set strict boundaries and rules for those who choose to follow the faith, there seems to be a misconception about Muslims being the most conservative and restrictive among all other groups. As someone belonging to this faith, and as someone who grew up in a Muslim-majority country, I can tell you one thing with absolute certainty: not every Muslim follows the rules of Islam to the letter.
After all, Muslims are not a monolith. People are not monoliths. I have written about this before in a post where I explained some of my issues with religion–how in film and literature and even on social media, only a certain type of Muslims are allowed to exist: reserved, conservative, pious to a fault.
So when I saw the representation of not just one, but several flawed Muslim characters in Between Two Moons by Aisha Abdel Gawad, I couldn’t help but rejoice. It’s not enough for me to simply have representation–I want true, authentic Muslim representation and that is exactly what I got with Between Two Moons.
2. Gentle Parenting In An Arab Family
Whether you were born in India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nigeria, Kenya, Korea or Egypt or Palestine–if there’s one thing that unites us children of color, it’s our universal experience of growing up getting occasionally beaten by our mothers (and mastering the art of dodging a chappal flying at your face).
And while it’s always a little entertaining to make jokes about how we brown kids get hit by our parents (dark humor is the only we can cope), it was so refreshing to see Arab parents use gentle parenting in Between Two Moons by Aisha Abdel Gawad.
This does not mean that Amira and Lina’s parents were not stern when they needed to be. There were plenty of times when we saw the girls’ parents lose their patience and temper as tensions began to skyrocket and the girls kept rebelling in their own ways–but what truly brought tears to my eyes was the way the twins’ parents showed affection and forgiveness by cooking food, and vulnerability and empathy by sharing their own past traumas.
And it is by showing their soft side, we really get to see the immeasurable strength Amira and Lina’s parents had to hold in their hearts to uproot their whole lives and start anew as immigrants in a country that hated them. Unlike most Young Adult books, Amira and Lina’s parents are not simply side characters–they are always present throughout the story and actively shape the lives of their children, just as parents are supposed to do.
3. Amira’s Struggles With Religion, Faith And Spirituality
I don’t think we ever truly talk about how difficult it is for children to grow up in a hypersexual society, especially if they were born and raised in conservative cultures. There are so many debates about sex positivity and sex education and teaching consent to teenagers, but not enough conversation on how to provide that same education to children who were born in a culture that values modesty and chastity.
Between Two Moons by Aisha Abdel Gawad shows us exactly what happens to these children–the confusion and conflicting emotions they have to process trying to navigate their identities while growing up surrounded by polarizing ideals. Amira’s struggles with her faith and spirituality, her journey of trying to figure out what kind of young woman she wants to be versus what kind of young woman she should be as a “good” Muslim, and even how to define a “good” Muslim–all of that conflict is laid out so authentically in the pages of Between Two Moons.
In more than one way, Amira’s experiences truly resonated with me, and I believe it is an experience that is nearly universal to every teenager regardless of where they come from–our most defining years are spent amidst the chaotic, deafening sounds of other people telling us how we should be defining ourselves.
4. The Painful Reality of Pervasive Surveillance On Muslims
The entire premise of Between Two Moons by Aisha Abdel Gawad focuses on the racialized hate and intense surveillance that Muslims in predominantly Arab communities have had to endure since 9/11. And yet, I was completely unprepared for the disturbing, invasive surveillance reports that Aisha Abdel Gawad had created based on actual documents published by the Associated Press in their report about NYPD’s illegal surveillance of Muslims.
It wasn’t simply the extreme details that were collected in the surveillance report that bothered me–it was the demonizing of simple, everyday acts in the reports. Someone picks up a Quran, and immediately they are flagged as a potential threat in the reports. Someone raises their voice after a long day of manual labor, and the reports label them as “volatile”, and “potentially threatening”.
And the greatest tragedy is that even after these reports were released, there are still people today in 2024 who justify this racial profiling. Just a few months ago, Aisha Abdel Gawad wrote about her traumatic experience of years of witnessing the Palestinian genocide in her article No Safe Place To Grieve, and the article is full of comments by people trying to not only justify the genocide but going so far as to put the burden of blame for the author’s own trauma on her own culture and faith.
This painful reality that is so accurately portrayed in Between Two Moons might come across as something out of a movie for non-Muslim readers. But the non-Muslim world at large sees no difference between Arabs and Muslims–which might explain why even though I grew up in a South Asian Muslim majority country, I was raised to be vigilant about what opinions I shared online, lest it be used against me to take away my chances of ever pursuing a degree abroad.
5. The Exploitative, Violent Revenge Against Girls Who Say “No”
Part of growing up means coming to terms with your sexuality, a feat that comes with a long list of cautionary tales. The experiences of Amira and Lina as they try to push the limits of how many rules they can break during their last summer together perfectly capture just how unsafe our girls are–because even if we teach them consent, even if we provide them sex education, they are still girls at the end of the day, living in a world where boys and men do not hesitate to take violent revenge on them if they dare to say “no”.
6. Double Standards Set By Men When It Comes To “Women’s Virtue”
One of the things that have always irked me, when it came to any religion or cultural practices, is how the same rules that are applied to both men and women have very different consequences for each of them. I have seen this quite a bit in South Asian cultures, but having lived in Canada for several months now, I realize now that this phenomenon happens everywhere. Because it is ultimately a result of the patriarchal society we live in, and in that society, double standard exists regardless of whether you are brown or white.
And in Between Two Moons by Aisha Abdel Gawad, we get to experience this double standard at every turn as Amira tries to figure out what she wants in a romantic relationship as as teenager curious about sex, as opposed to what she should want as a good Muslim girl who can only have chaste romantic relationships. And I will not lie, I was not the biggest fan of the romance in this book the moment a certain character got upset about Amira’s hijab slipping off slightly, even though they were making out just minutes earlier.
But it wasn’t until the end of the book that I realized that there is actually no real romance in Between Two Moons, it’s simply a story about how to grow up as a Muslim girl in a world that has already decided what you can be and cannot be.
7. The Solidarity Of The Gossiping Neighborhood Aunties
As much as we brown kids love making fun of our nosy, gossiping neighborhood aunties, we have to admit–you cannot ask for a better ride-or-die than the auntie network. In Between Two Moons by Aisha Abdel Gawad, the “gossiping, meddling aunties” shine in the best of ways–from the way they add color and liveliness with their wild theories to the way they stand in brave solidarity with their neighbors in times of trouble.
8. The Bond Between The Twins And Their Older Brother
The arrival of Sami is one of the main triggers that sets the plot in motion, and so naturally Sami’s relationship with his twin sisters are integral to the story. The bond between the siblings is done so masterfully in Between Two Moons–from the complicated feelings the girls have growing up with a brother who was drowning in his own trauma to the slow, and quiet understanding that eventually develops between them all. Sibling relationships are rarely perfect, but the love is always there. And Between Two Moons by Aisha Abdel Gawad captures that in the most authentic, heartwrenching way.
To summarize, there are very, VERY few young adult books out there for Muslim kids growing up in a world that is so quick to demonize them. We need more stories that capture their authentic experiences. And while everyone’s story is unique, Between Two Moons by Aisha Abdel Gawad is a story that will no doubt resonate with children of immigrants all over the world.