Teen Tuesday: Huda F are You? by Huda Fahmy

Image: Penguin Random House

Huda F are You? by Huda Fahmy. 188 p. Dial Books for Young Readers/ Penguin Young Readers Group, November, 2021. 9780593324301. (Review of finished purchased copy.)

Happy Tuesday! It's still winter here in NJ, a brisk 24 degrees when I took the hounds out for their morning trot at 5AM. The title of our Teen Tuesday feature sure is attention-grabbing, so hang on to your hat! 

Teen Tuesday features Huda F Are You? by Huda Fahmy. Did you see what the author did there? The main character in this fictionalized graphic novel memoir is Huda Fahmy, Huda F. is an Egyptian-American. She is also a hijab-wearing Muslim who has recently moved from a town in Michigan, wear she was the only hijabi, to Dearborn, where she is one of so many, that there are hijabi cliques, like the athletes, gamers and fashionistas. As the second of five daughters, she knows exactly who she is in her family, the smart one, but in her new high school? Not so much, so she experiments with personas with often humorous but embarrassing results. Sadly, Huda still deals with micro-aggressions and outright hostility, especially from her English teacher, who thinly hides her racism.

The art is simple and clean with lots of white space and easy to follow panels. Readers are sure to root for Huda F. as she finds herself. I'd love to read a sequel.