Book Drop // Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie
Kamsie's novel reimagines the Greek tragedy 'Antigone' in the story of two British-Pakistani families divided over the fate of a rebel brother who has joined ISIS. The play's messy moral conflicts - of love and obligation, justice and law, family and country - are explored in modern London, in a layered tragedy of cultural tension and radicalisation. Stained with the fear and shame of their father's jihadi past, two sisters in Wembley have divided positions upon learning that their brother Parvaiz has travelled to Syria to fight with Isis.
In the meantime, Karamat is the first British-Pakistani to become Home Secretary and through his son’s connections with the sisters, the two families are drawn together as one sister strives to bring her brother home. Karamat forbids Parvaiz's return, stripping him of his British citizenship and metaphorically leaving him outside the city gates to rot.
For me, the best works of art, whether they be novels, poems, artworks or pieces of music, are the ones that are delicately layered with many strands that work in multiple directions but that come together in lyrical cohesion. Is love familial, marital, sexual or fraternal? Is loyalty political, dutiful, decided or unconditional? Are families nuclear, cultural, political or chosen? Is tragedy epic or everyday?
Shamsie deftly and succinctly (the novel is less than 300 pages) gives us a multi-faceted story from the perspectives of five well-defined characters; their subjectivities and biases ensure that weighty issues of British politics, citizenship, radicalisation and family are explored sensitively and intelligently. This novel ticked all the boxes for me; it told me something about the world, it let me walk in the shoes of someone else, it made me uncomfortable and it ignited my imagination with brave and profound lyrical imagery. And that final scene? Unexpected, heart in mouth, five star story-telling.