The Ordinary Chaos of Being Human | BOOK REVIEW
It's almost Christmas and everyone has been posting their end-of-the-year wrap-ups, book rankings, etc. I've never done any of those things before but I might try for 2020 so that I personally have something good come out of it. This Friday I will also be posting a new episode of Fantasy Recs Friday so look out for all of those!
For now, thank you to Frankie from Penguin SEA for sending me a copy of this book, it was enlightening to read and I highly recommend it. I wish there were more anthologies like this out there.
ABOUT THE BOOK
Title: The Ordinary Chaos of Being Human
Editor: Marguerite Richards
Publisher: Penguin Random House SEA
Published: 2019
Genre: Non-fiction
Summary:
An anthology revealing the multi-faceted experiences of people living in many Muslim worlds, which both challenges stereotypes and the responsibility to disband them.
Two schoolgirls in Yemen skip class, and wander into a yellow circus tent, empty except for one rusty cage. A Jordanian man spends a maddening summer in his sweaty apartment cursing his loud, ignorant neighbours. A woman in Beirut is heartsick, waiting for her kidnapped parrot to return. A young Bangladeshi-American argues with her father about her choice of boyfriend. A lady discovers the secret about the Pakistani neighbour who had stolen her birthday gifts. And an Iraqi soldier pines for an American journalist obsessed with someone else.
This ambitious collection is a four-year quest to find diverse stories from many Muslim worlds that build bridges between each of us, through intimate, and incredibly human experiences of love, loss, laughter and everything in between.
I received a copy of The Ordinary Chaos of Being Human from Penguin SEA in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
THE REVIEW— overall thoughts: ⭑⭑⭑⭑ —
⇢ trigger warnings// suicide (mentioned and discussed), death of a loved one, child death, war
This was such an emotional story and it’s evident how close each of these stories is to the authors that wrote them. And it translates to me, as a reader, ten-fold.
One of the authors is a Filipino actually based in Manila, if I’m not mistaken, and I cannot express how happy that made me. Criselda Yabes wrote “Fron Sulu, a Farewell to Dad” and I might have teared up because of how close to home it hit me. Even though it wasn’t written in Tagalog there was something about the writing that felt familiar even though I have never read from this author before. It might have also been the mention of places that I grew up visiting that made the story feel close to my heart.
There were too many relatable stories and this is one of the non-fiction books I’ve read that contained a lot of stories that personally stuck. Even then, as what is normal for a short story collection, not all of the stories were for me but the number of stories that I resonated with trumps the ones that I felt like other people could relate to more.
I was surprised at the difference in backgrounds the authors came from. Some were photographers, playwrights, poets, full-time writers, bloggers, etc. that came from parts of SEA and Euro-America. I think the authors were able to successfully convey their experiences in an enjoyable way for the readers to process. I would love to see more fully local SEA Muslim authors if they ever do another compilation similar to this, however.
There were a lot of discussions brought up about the Muslim culture and how their history has shaped our present, especially how these all related. It took me some time to read, decipher, and process everything just because it’s not a culture that I’m particularly familiar with. Nevertheless, I learned a lot and I’m really happy I read this.
I’m glad I read this even though it was outside of my comfort zone, I always like learning more about other southeast Asian cultures.
I can't believe 2020 is ending, I felt like it barely happened but also too many things happened at the same time.
stay safe, wear a mask, enjoy your books ♡
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