by Seemi Aziz, Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, OK

This, again is a novel that dramatically represents  the consequences of immigration specifically as it deals with ‘illegal’ immigrants or ‘undocumented’ citizens. This story is about a Bangladeshi Muslim family that is trying to flee to Canada in the aftermath of 9/11 as their papers have expired. The father is arrested, detained and later imprisoned at Canadian border by American authorities and the mother decides to send back the two daughters, Nadira and Ayesha to New York so that they can continue their education and their life goes on uninterrupted. Nadira, the narrator, finds strengths in her that she is not conscious of before and Aisha breaks down even though she is supposed to be the strong one. The story ends with Nadira finding out that it is matter of mistaken identity and the family is eventually cleared.

This story, even though it has many flaws like that of no culturally authentic reflection of Bangladeshis and the extreme cordiality of the U.S. authorities for this family, is a necessary one as it portrays the razor’s edge that immigrant Muslims moving to the U.S. presently walk on. The perils of undocumented citizens are played up, providing it as an acceptable excuse for all that happened to this family. Ask Me No Questions disregards the documented fact that legal immigrants/citizens also went through and are going through many of the things represented in this story.

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• Themes: Ask me No Questions, Seemi Aziz
• Descriptors: Books & Resources, Debates & Trends, WOW Currents