Customer Reviews

Blue-eyed Devil

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This road Odyssey through Islamic America is facinating, and will be enjoyed by those who are quite new to this matter as much as by those who are already familiar with the deep facts and legends regarding the presence of the Islamic faith in America. A talented author (sort of a story teller like Slick Rick or GhostFace), Knight is sharing his car and greyhound trips, his questioning and faith, his anger and love, his hopes and fears in full honesty... In all his trips and tribulations he ends up painting the face of nowadays muslim America... muslim punks, muslims for Bush, ego oriented progressives, five percenters, and simple sincere believers... Knight meets them all along his journey, in the streets, in masjids, in cemeteries.
He make readers laugh and shock some others, unaware of the often provocative content of Knights writings. He writes about who he is, straight from the guts, his honesty is what matter ultimately since he's not asking anyone to think like and what he thinks. He met, in his very unique way, face to face with Islam in America, its present diversity and ancient history. His quest to uncover the mystery surrounding Master Fard's life(s) is one of the key component of the book and one of the key to understand the different faces of Islam in America today.

Got this from the cut-out bin at my local big box, which is a damn shame. That being said, I'm glad it was there, because I loved this book. Knight doesn't run from the conflicts throughout the various strains of Islam in the U.S. Instead, he distills a unique and personal understanding, and invites us to share and take what we will. I found his journey profoundly moving, and one to which I could personally relate. As someone who's dug through his own share of mess on the Christian side of things, I'm quite thankful for Mr. Knight's courage and candor. It's a hell of a fun read, and spiritually engaging for those who read with open minds and hearts.

I taught this book last year in a high school "Introduction to Islam" course.

My students responded to it powerfully -- Michael Muhammad Knight is a hip-hop Holden Caulfield, shockingly honest and problematically Muslim, a white kid from Buffalo who found Islam after listening to "Public Enemy" and then found himself for a time in Pakistan.

It isn't a "nice" book, and the story is not "clean," either narratively or morally. Many will be troubled about the notion of Knight as a "spokesman" for Islam in any respect. In a quest for "balance," I found myself supplementing the book with other more mainstream voices of those who have re-verted to Islam, and I'm glad I did. Not all stories are so messy, and it's tempting (especially for students) to romanticize that mess...although, to his credit, that is not Knight's aim.

But Knight uses his own messy story to explore the complexity of American Islam: its aspirations, competing narratives of liberation, its challenges for young people, and especially for those raised in the faith but trying to find their place as Americans within mainstream culture, etc.

And Knight's portrayal of that complexity -- how bewildering it can be -- is accurate in many ways. Accurate about some of the fault lines, anyway.

It is also a "road book," and Knight goes all over the country by bus and beat up car in search of love, recognition, and in ambivalent pilgrimage to the historic sites of American Islam.

It brings up many things and asks more questions than it answers. After a while, we all got sick of it. And yet, my students described it as a highlight of the term.

There are many other wonderful books to choose that talk about modern Islam. And yet, this is one with the capacity to move many people in ways that can be surprising...and to surprise many people in ways that can be moving.

Having read this book, all of the other reviews have correctly identified some 'issue' of interest to them. However, I just want to make it perfectly clear that this book is not written by a devout Muslim, who after having read dozens of books about Islam, has decided to `liberalize' Islam by embracing punk-rock music. The author has read several Islamic books (or at least has browsed through Wikipedia) and can toss out some Muslim ideas in his writings. On the bookcover is one reviewer's comment: "This book should contribute immensely to retiring the public's knee-jerk reaction to Islam" - couldn't be further from the truth. This isn't a book about Islamic theology and how it can be modernized. Essentially, this book is a young heavy-metal punk-rocker's bus ride to graveyards were the mortal remains of the founders of the American version of the "Nation of Islam" (Fard/Elijah Muhammad/Malcom X) are buried - and where the author sleeps near/upon their graves overnight (after jumping over security fences to gain entrance). Sufi Muslims (which the author purports to be) believe in visiting the grave-shrines of other Muslims to get closer to Allah, although Sunni Muslim oppose this `idolatry' worship. Don't read this book if you want to learn something about Islam. But, if you are interested in learning more about heavy-metal, punk Islam, then read the author's follow-up book: "Journey to the End of Islam" - which is better written and tosses in more Islamic stuff (which still won't add much to your understanding of Islam though). No footnotes, no bibliography of reference books.

The general argumentation is purely existential based on gut conviction, often equality (marihuana or hashish) induced. Just that conviction that is coming from an inner quasi-hormonal build-up that cannot and does not imagine there could be another point of view. The author seems to be critical of this approach, but he is trying to explore it and explain how American Muslims can come to that mental stand which is the negation of any critical sense since there can only be one truth and it comes from that gut-conviction that the proper words are truth, and the proper words have to come from the Quran enriched with Sunni and Shia ritual beliefs and practices. Which by the way, sets the whole gut-conviction and Quran at a slant, at a tilt, menacing to kick over. And yet the author tries to go beyond by "building" (meaning in his street language talking, discussing and blabbering) with all trends and trying to find some historical dimension in Islam in America that is not post 9/11. He is confronted to two hostilities. That from the WASPs, which is essentially anti-Islam by religious and political principles, as the scapegoat that appointed himself in that role by attacking the WASPs on 9/11 to give them a justification to be anti-Islam, to treat Muslims as scapegoats and thus to justify Muslims in their closure to the world. The second trend of hostility comes from the fact he is a white convert, hence a blue-eyed devil. And that hostility comes from both Muslims who only see the Caucasian in him and from Christians who only see a traitor of his race in his religion. Then he envisages the problem of women who are both Muslims and feminists and who look for and find in the Quran what they need to be feminists as well as Muslims: how can the energy necessary to change traditions come from or be found in these traditions themselves? And that's where the book is most interesting since the author was not born in these traditions and he may or might have the tendency, like many converts to be more royal than the King himself, like the Big Mac they called Mac Royal in Paris. He is looking for traditions and seems to be hard set at finding them. In Pakistan he found quite non-converging views, some leading to the Talibans in Afghanistan or the Shias in Iran, whereas others tried to find a way from Pakistani Shia to Western modernism.. In the same way in the US he is divided when looking for the historical pioneers of Islam and finding out that some are plain mysteries and not from Islam originally but from Hindu India or from good old Greek Christianity, in other words first or second generation converts who are immigrants into Islam. Yet that presence of Islam in the USA goes back far behind the Nation of Islam and very probably into the 19th century or even farther. He tries to understand the dilemma of girls confronted to their desire to discover sex and yet to remain pure, or his desire to get sex and not soil the girls, their desire to marry out of love and yet to remain within their family traditions and their set marriages. The parents may even accept for the daughters to choose their husbands provided these are not X nor Y nor Z and other fundamental elements like the color, race or height of the chosen ones. How can you be a Muslim (male or female) feminist and yet exclude sexual freedom, not to speak of promiscuity and rotating partners, the very western tradition of polygamy, many women but one after the other and never at the same time. And how can you defend thios sexual freedom, not to speak of ..., without becoming a colonial imperialist in post-colonial times. A fascinating book though quite difficult to find.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne, University Versailles Saint Quentin en Yvelines, CEGID

I am all for people trying to make a dollar by being creative, but this guy is using Islam like a football player uses a football. He kicks it around wherever and however he feels like and if someone has a problem with that, he will challenge you to a wrestling match. I read most of the book in a Barnes and Noble store - which I put back on the shelf next to a Sex for Dummies book - and found a few pages that really disgusted me. He was on the bed with a girl who I think he was dating and she left some menstruation blood on the bed sheets. This freak cuts out a piece of the bed cloth and puts it in his pocket for memories or something. Does this sound like something a Muslim would do.

One page in particular was really twisted where he quotes the first verse in the Quran,"Read in the name of your Lord who created man..." and right under it he quotes what he read on a restroom wall in a greyhound bus station, which repeatedly talks about women sucking (insert a word that rhymes with docks). They "suck big ones, small ones," and all kinds of them. In my mind I was thinking, what kind of sick dude is this and how can he call himself a Muslim? We don't need punks or blue eyed devils to keep Islam going or to keep it real for Muslims. I recommend Muslims to stay away from this book, unless they want to pollute their minds with immoral thoughts. My message to the author is get your stuff together man. Muslims are "the best people evolved for mankind" 3:110. You are not showing people that example.

I read this book during the first weekend I got it and it messed with my head in a big way. It's about American Islam but Knight and his own faith/lack of faith really make it work. Clear your schedule and prepare to question.

UPDATE

The text above is from my original review, which was probably two years ago. I said what needed to be said then but I'll take the time to elaborate now for those who want a more fully developed picture of what they're getting into.

I want to start by mentioning two widely read books which this book compares favorably too. The first is On The Road by Jack Kerouac and the second is In Patagonia by Bruce Chatwin. The first comparison is one that is commonly made and very valid, these two books share a sort of crazy energy and sweep the reader across equal (but different) parts of North America.

I was also reminded of In Patagonia because both books take the reader to unexpected places and truly give on the feeling of being along for the ride. Blue-eyed Devil is certainly a wild ride.

Now to the book itself and the factors which make it worth reading. While this is a non-fiction it is also great storytelling and Knight lets the characters draw you in. They range from the the anonymous and nearly anonymous (peace to Lawrence Nixon) to the quasi-famous (like Asma Gull Hasan) and MMK treats them all with what seems to me a good deal of empathy and honesty. These are all real people who exist in our world and Knight seems to be especially aware of that as writes them into the reality of this story giving them fully human dimensions.

In the process of creating (or recreating) these characters Knight becomes a character himself and a compelling one. If the character he writes himself as isn't always perfect--personally I'd be happy to share a slice and conversation with Mike Knight on any sidewalk in America--it's all the more reason to respect him. Knight could've made himself look any way he wanted to and he chose to portray himself accurately undersized lun and all.

The other powerful element that emerges from getting to know the character version of Michael Muhammad Knight is his compelling curiosity and mission to find the "true" story of Wallace Fard Muhammad. Before I began reading this book my attitude toward the Nation of Islam was basically, "Malcolm carried them and was right to leave them." Knight digs deeper and deeper into the story exposing layers of the Islamic-American experience long hidden away. His quest for meaning becomes the reader's quest as well and we're better for the change.

I can't tell you that you'll like this book because I don't know you. What I can say is that over the past six years I've averaged 3-5 books a month and this is one of the best, I've read it more than once and will read it again. I hope that this may indicate something of it's value and lasting impact.

Peace