Aubrey Nye Hamilton Reviews: Perfectly Nice Neighbors by Kia Abdullah

Kia Abdullah’s latest thriller, Perfectly Nice Neighbors (Putnam, 2023), published in the U.K. as Those People Next Door (Harper Collins, 2023), takes the reader to a middle-class community in London, where Salma and Bilal Khatun and their teen-aged son Zain have moved to get away from a less desirable part of the city. From the beginning, differences between them and their neighbors arise. Their neighbor objects to the “Black Lives Matter” banner that Zain posts in the Khatun front yard. Salma finds it on the ground a few times and then she sees the neighbor knock it down. She confronts him and he is furious that she dared to challenge him. Complaints about parking and cooking smells ensue. Salma’s car is damaged. All the while, the unofficial community president and busybody keeps advising Salma that the neighborhood is nice and that she should try to fit in.

Zain records one of the confrontations between the neighbor and his mother, and he posts it to Twitter. The image of the large white man looming over the smaller brown woman goes viral, and the neighbor loses his job. Tension skyrockets, between the neighbors and between Salma and Bilal, who wants his wife to back down and ignore the abuse. He’s worried about money, having lost his restaurant during the pandemic shutdown; the family is barely making ends meet. They cannot afford to move again. Salma thinks that the meanness has to be faced or it will never stop.

The outcome of the animosity is completely unexpected and changes both families forever.

Abdullah describes the attempts of second- and third-generation immigrants in England to create a home and to go about their business while being viewed askance by those whose families have been in the country much longer. It makes for painful reading. Racism and intolerance appear in the most unlikely places; Abdullah makes it her mission to display the uncompromising reality.

The role of social media in polarizing contemporary society does not escape her eagle eye. The speed that word spread about the conflict via Twitter drew the line between the two families more deeply and left little room for easy resolution of their differences.

Abdullah is one of those contemporary thriller writers who tells a good story while highlighting serious social issues. It isn’t hard to see parallels between the experience of immigrants in the U.K. and here in the U.S. Her books are not easy to read but they always give me a lot to think about. Recommended.

·         Publisher: ‎G.P. Putnam's Sons (September 12, 2023)

·         Language: ‎English

·         Paperback: ‎352 pages

·         ISBN-10: ‎0593713818

·         ISBN-13: ‎978-0593713815

 

Aubrey Nye Hamilton ©2023 

Aubrey Hamilton is a former librarian who works on Federal It projects by day and reads mysteries at night.

Aubrey Nye Hamilton: Take It Back by Kia Abdullah

In my quest for new-to-me women crime writers, Kia Abdullah, a British author and travel writer based in London, came to my attention. She has a university degree in computer science and worked in the technology field for a few years before turning to writing. She has been published in The New York Times, the Guardian, the Telegraph, the BBC, and the Times. She established Asian Booklist, http://www.asianbooklist.com/, a website that promotes British-Asian authors. Asian Booklist monitors traditional publishers for frequency of appearance of its constituency, just as Sisters in Crime monitors the publishing industry for the appearance of women authors.

Her first book Take It Back (St. Martin’s Press, 2020) is a searing courtroom thriller that highlights issues of sex, race, culture, and social justice. Zara Kaleel, the youngest daughter of Muslim immigrants, walked away from an arranged marriage to the great distress of her family. She threw herself into her legal career until she decided she wanted to be of more meaningful service. She took a legal position with Artemis House, a center supporting sexual assault and abuse victims.

Jodie Wolfe is a facially disfigured and disabled teenager whose alcoholic mother ignores and neglects her. She reports that she was raped by four teenagers from her school. She is white and the four boys are Muslim. Zara is viciously attacked by the Muslim community for taking sides against the boys, creating an even greater rift between her and her family. The courtroom testimony, ripping Jodie and the boys apart in full view of the world, is wrenching. The ending is nothing short of shocking.

This story highlights the contemporary Muslim culture in England. Multiple surprises popped up, even when I thought no more could be fit into the plot. The supporting characters are excellent: Zara’s confused but loving mother, Artemis House investigator Erin Quinto, and Detective Constable Mia Scavo from the local police force.

This story is as much disturbing social commentary as anything else: the difficult lives of Muslim women are described in hair-raising terms. The damage that social media can cause is personified as Jodie is savagely pilloried in online forums. The disparity between acceptable male behavior and acceptable female behavior that transcends any one race or religion is relentlessly emphasized. Not an easy read.

Named one of the best thrillers of the year by the Guardian and the Telegraph. Starred reviews from Publishers Weekly and Booklist. For crime fiction buffs seeking to broaden the diversity of their reading, anyone interested in contemporary social justice, and legal thriller fans.

Not for anyone who is triggered by descriptions of sexual assault.

 

·         Publisher: ‎ St. Martin's Press (December 8, 2020)

·         Language: ‎ English

·         Hardcover: ‎ 304 pages

·         ISBN-10: ‎ 1250273013

·         ISBN-13: ‎ 978-1250273017

 

Aubrey Nye Hamilton ©2021

Aubrey Hamilton is a former librarian who works on Federal It projects by day and reads mysteries at night.