Customer Reviews

Wanting Mor

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Jameela had already experienced so much hardship as a youngster living in Afghanistan during the Taliban's stronghold and then the American invasion. She lived in poverty and had no education, she had lost a number of family members to violence and disease, and she had to deal with the inevitable stares when people saw her cleft lip. Then on the most devastating day of all, her mother died after a brief illness. With virtually no time to grieve the loss of her Mor, Jameela was forced to leave the village with her drug-addicted father for the capital city in an ill-conceived plan to find new work.

Life for Jameela in Kabul was grim and dismal as she worked under slave-like conditions, first in a temporary situation and then in the household of a surly woman who her father had suddenly married. The step-mother despised Jameela and instructed her new husband to abandon Jameela in a busy Kabul market. Inexplicably, he complied, and Jameela was left completely and totally alone. Ultimately, it took the kindness of strangers, inspiration from her strong faith, memories of her precious Mor, and the power of an education to turn her life around in the most surprising and ironic of ways.

Wanting Mor stands out as a mesmerizing book with lively characters, heartbreaking plot developments, and incredibly rich cultural content. Jameela's plight is representative of the wide-scale devaluation of the social and economic status of women and girls in Central Asia, which has led to the abandonment and neglect of unwanted girls. Based on a true event, this book provides testament to the depths of the problem and the possibilities for change.

We live in a hard old world, even though for many of us that fact is disguised by pleasant surroundings.

And the only thing that gets any of us through is faith, hope and occasionally the kindness of strangers.

This book is deeply touching.

It tells the tale of a young girl whose mother recently died, and her father isn't properly taking care of her. She struggles to keep going after her father remarries. She was born with a lip deformity, and she is frightened because she believes she will be teased because of it.

This reveiw is neither good, nor very descriptive, but believe me.

This is a GOOD book.

This is Khan's first YA novel. She is an award winning children's author in Canada. Jameela lives in a small village in Kandahar, Afghanistan. Set around 2001, Jameela has grown up surrounded by war. When Jameela's Mor (mother), dies, she is lost. Soon after the funeral, Jameela's baba, (father) sells everything they own and moves them to the city of Kabul. When they first got their, Jameela did her best to figure out the new world she was in. Her baba didn't care too much for her welfare. Without her mor their was no one to answer her questions, all she could do was follow. Jameela's baba remarries, the new wife works her very hard and he doesn't intervene. One day the new wife decides she doesn't want Jameela around. Jameela's baba leaves her in the market. It was very sad to see how trusting Jameela was, standing for hours before she would even sit because she worried her baba wouldn't see her when he returned. Luckliy for Jameela, a kind butcher takes her home with him to his family. Eventually, Jameela is placed in an orphanage. I didn't know if that was a good or bad thing, but it was still upsetting that Jameela was at the mercy of so many people. The orphanage turns out to be where Jameela finds a new home. She finally gets to go to school and make friends. Khan draws out several of the secondary characters to making the novel more interesting. I really enjoyed Wanting Mor and found I couldn't stop reading. When I was away from it I found myself thinking about Jameela. Jameela dreamed of her Mor often. She is a practicing Muslim, throughout the book Jameela says her prayers. Khan's weaves Jameela's faith and prayers seamlessly into the story. The author also incorporates a few Farsi, Pushto and Arabic words, from the surrounding sentences it was pretty easy to figure out what the words meant. Nothing miraculous or unbelievable happens and that's part of Wanting Mor's beauty. Its simply the story of a girl from a village, who moves to the city, tethered to no one and how quickly she could get lost and forgotten.

This book should be taught in the context of the culture from which it springs. Without that context, it can be very damaging to tweens and teens in the United States. If you can't be beautiful, at least be good. That's the strong message that begins and ends this book. Another message: "Men are supposed to be the caretakers of women, not the other way around." One more: If a female is not "properly" covered, she opens herself up to sexual abuse. And she deserves it. The most egregious scene portrays a girl receiving an inappropriate, sexual squeeze of her breast by a boy. The burka-wearing heroine views the act and says, "I knew I shouldn't find it funny. But..." And I was thinking, Darned right, you shouldn't!