The Things I Would Tell You

Selected as Emma Watson's Jan/Feb 2019 pick for her feminist book club, Our Shared Shelf A Guardian Best Book of the Year Shortlisted for London's Big Read From established literary heavyweights to emerging spoken word artists, the writers in this ground-breaking collection blow away the narrow image of the 'Muslim Woman'. Hear from users of Islamic Tinder, a disenchanted Maulana working as a TV chat show host and a plastic surgeon blackmailed by MI6. Follow the career of an actress with Middle-Eastern heritage whose dreams of playing a ghostbuster spiral into repeat castings as a jihadi bride. Among stories of honour killings and ill-fated love in besieged locations, we also find heart-warming connections and powerful challenges to the status quo. From Algiers to Brighton, these stories transcend time and place revealing just how varied the search for belonging can be. Alongside renowned authors such as Kamila Shamsie, Ahdaf Soueif and Leila Aboulela are emerging voices, published here for the first time.

Sabrina Mahfouz is a British Egyptian playwright, poet and screenwriter. She was awarded the 2014 Fringe First Award for her play Chef and her first play, Dry Ice, was directed by David Schwimmer. Her poetry has been performed and produced for TV, radio and film, including in the recent Railway Nation: A Journey in Verse on BBC2. Mahfouz has an essay in the award-winning The Good Immigrant and has published eight works of drama with Bloomsbury. She lives in London.

Introduction 7; Fadia Faqir, Under the Cypress Tree 15; Amina Jama, Home, to a Man and other poems 30; Chimene Suleyman, Cutting Someone's Heart Out with a Spoon 37; Us 44; Aliyah Hasinah Holder, Sentence and other poems 48; Kamila Shamsie, The Girl Next Door 55; Imtiaz Dharker, The Right Word and other poems 74; Triska Hamid, Islamic Tinder 81; Nafeesa Hamid, This Body Is Woman 85; Ahdaf Soueif, Mezzaterra 96; Seema Begum, Uomini Cadranno 114; Leila Aboulela, The Insider 117; Shazea Quraishi, Fallujah, Basrah and other poems 154; Shaista Aziz, Blood and Broken Bodies 161; Miss L, Stand By Me 166;Aisha Mirza, Staying Alive Through Brexit: Racism, Mental Health and Emotional Labour 170; Hibaq Osman, The Things I Would Tell You and other poems 175; Azra Tabassum, Brown Girl and other poems 185; Selma Dabbagh, Take Me There 191; Last Assignment to Jenin 196; Asma Elbadawi, Belongings and other poems 205; Samira Shackle, My Other Half 209; Sabrina Mahfouz, Battleface 218; Hanan al-Shaykh, An Eye That Sees 238; Biographies 247; Credits 255