Book Review: Exit West by Mohsin Hamid
Exit West by Mohsin Hamid
Publisher: Riverhead Books
Release Date: March 7, 2017
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Publisher’s Description:
In a country teetering on the brink of civil war, two young people meet—sensual, fiercely independent Nadia and gentle, restrained Saeed. They embark on a furtive love affair, and are soon cloistered in a premature intimacy by the unrest roiling their city. When it explodes, turning familiar streets into a patchwork of checkpoints and bomb blasts, they begin to hear whispers about doors—doors that can whisk people far away, if perilously and for a price. As the violence escalates, Nadia and Saeed decide that they no longer have a choice. Leaving their homeland and their old lives behind, they find a door and step through. . . .
Exit West follows these remarkable characters as they emerge into an alien and uncertain future, struggling to hold on to each other, to their past, to the very sense of who they are. Profoundly intimate and powerfully inventive, it tells an unforgettable story of love, loyalty, and courage that is both completely of our time and for all time.
Exit West is about Nadia and Saeed, who live in a nameless war torn Muslim country, most likely in the Middle East. Saeed is a devout Muslim, while Nadia is an independent non-believer who is single, yet lives alone in her own apartment, which is almost unheard of. They meet at a night class and soon begin a relationship. They decide to leave their country in search of a better life. They find a magical door and walk through it. On the other side is the Greek island of Mykonos. After living there for a while, they go through another door and end up somewhere else, and so on. Their relationship evolves and eventually devolves throughout their journey. Hamid’s depiction of the disintegration of a relationship was so authentic, I thought it was amazing.
I thought using the doors as a device to get Nadia and Saeed from place to place was inventive and creative. This allowed Hamid to focus on their lives as immigrants in the places they traveled to without getting bogged down in all of the red tape that immigrating in real life involves. There’s no way they could have lived in so many places otherwise.
My book club read Exit West a few months ago – it was a great selection. It brings up so many issues related to immigration and refugees to talk about. Nadia is an interesting person to discuss as well. Though she is not religious, she wears traditional Muslim dress, even when she and Saeed move to other countries. We talked about why she does this as well as about Nadia and Saeed’s relationship. Recommended.
