An New York Times Book Review Editor's Choice * An NPR Best Book of the Year * A Padma Lakshmi Book Club Pick
For fans of On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous and A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, an unforgettable story about female friendship and queer love in a Muslim-American community
“Stunningly beautiful.” ―The New York Times Book Review
“An unforgettable voice that moves you from the start.” ―People Magazine
Razia Mirza grows up amid the wild grape vines and backyard sunflowers of Corona, Queens, with her best friend, Saima, by her side. When a family rift drives the girls apart, Razia’s heart is broken. She finds solace in Taslima, a new girl in her close-knit Pakistani-American community. They embark on a series of small rebellions: listening to scandalous music, wearing miniskirts, and cutting school to explore the city.
When Razia is accepted to Stuyvesant, a prestigious high school in Manhattan, the gulf between the person she is and the daughter her parents want her to be, widens. At Stuyvesant, Razia meets Angela and is attracted to her in a way that blossoms into a new understanding. When their relationship is discovered by an Aunty in the community, Razia must choose between her family and her own future.
Punctuated by both joy and loss, full of ’80s music and beloved novels, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion is a new classic: a fiercely compassionate coming-of-age story of a girl struggling to reconcile her heritage and faith with her desire to be true to herself.
- Publisher : Flatiron Books
- Hardcover Release Date: December 6, 2022
- Paperback Release Date: December 5, 2023
- Language : English
- Hardcover & Paperback : 288 pages
- Hardcover: ISBN-13 : 978-1250834782
- Paperback: ISBN-13 : 978-1250834805
About The Author:
Bushra Rehman grew up in Corona, Queens but her mother says she was born in an ambulance flying through the streets of Brooklyn. This would explain a few things. Bushra was a vagabond poet who traveled for years with nothing more than a Greyhound ticket and a book bag full of poems. Her first novel Corona, a poetic on-the-road adventure about being South Asian in the United States, was chosen by the NY Public Library as one of its favorite novels about NYC. She’s co-editor of the seminal text on race and feminism Colonize This! Young Women of Color on Today’s Feminism and author of the collection of poetry Marianna’s Beauty Salon, described by Joseph O. Legaspi as “a love poem for Muslim girls, Queens, and immigrants making sense of their foreign home--and surviving.” Rehman’s next novel Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion which centers around the idea of friendship and queer desire among young Muslim women will be released in December with Flatiron Books.
- Publisher : Flatiron Books (December 5, 2023)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 288 pages
- ISBN-10 : 1250834805
- ISBN-13 : 978-1250834805
- Item Weight : 10.9 ounces
- Dimensions : 5.6 x 0.72 x 9 inches