Ahmed Aziz's Epic Year
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
This hilarious and poignant tween debut—which SLJ heralded as “destined to become a classic” in a starred review—tackles evergreen topics like dealing with bullies, making friends, and the power of good books. A great next read for fans of Merci Suárez Changes Gears and John David Anderson.
Ahmed Aziz is having an epic year—epically bad.
After his dad gets sick, the family moves from Hawaii to Minnesota for his dad’s treatment. Even though his dad grew up there, Ahmed can’t imagine a worse place to live. He’s one of the only brown kids in his school. And as a proud slacker, Ahmed doesn’t want to deal with expectations from his new teachers.
Ahmed surprises himself by actually reading the assigned books for his English class: Holes, Bridge to Terabithia, and From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. Shockingly, he doesn’t hate them. Ahmed also starts learning about his uncle, who died before Ahmed was born.
Getting bits and pieces of his family’s history might be the one upside of the move, even as his dad’s health hangs in the balance and the school bully refuses to leave him alone. Will Ahmed ever warm to Minnesota?
* A Chicago Public Library Kids Best Book of the Year * A BookPage Best Book of the Year * A Bank Street Best Book of the Year * Finalist for the Minnesota Book Award *
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Moving away from everything you've ever known is difficult for anyone, but 12-year-old Ahmed Aziz, who is Indian American and Muslim, has an especially difficult time as he and his family relocate from Hawaii to his father's hometown of Farthing, Minn. While the move allows Ahmed's father, who has cirrhosis, to receive experimental treatment, Ahmed is less than enthused that his parents selected Minnesota over the other two locations offering the treatment—California and Japan. Immersed in a mostly white environment and forced to deal with bullies for the first time in his life, Ahmed copes by doing something he rarely does: reading. As Ahmed and his classmates dissect Louis Sachar's Holes and other children's novels in their accelerated language arts class, Ahmed slowly begins to develop a love for reading, with his deepening understanding of the characters and analyses helping him to navigate interpersonal issues and change in his own life. Hamza writes with verve and a palpable fondness for her nuanced characters in this quietly absorbing debut middle grade novel, which offers discerning lessons on reading, love, and adaptation. Ages 8–12.
