THE COLOUR OF GOD

A memoir about growing up Muslim in Canada.

The same year that Chaudhry was born in Toronto, her Pakistani parents gave up on assimilation and turned to a version of Islam that the author describes variously as conservative, fundamentalist, extreme, and puritanical. “My parents didn’t think Islam should be a mosaic,” she writes. “They didn’t like the way Islam was being practised there—it was too diluted, too weak, too Western.” A professor of gender and Islamic studies, Chaudhry recounts a childhood and adolescence filled with pain, anger, and frustration as she attempted to live up to her parents’ high expectations of piety and modesty while living in a culture that did not understand or accept her. The author explains that her parents chose a conservative Muslim lifestyle as a shield from the racism they faced. As Pakistanis, they were judged by their skin color; as Muslims, they were judged for their belief system, a persecution that actually empowered them. Chaudhry’s retelling of her youth is ambiguous, perhaps intentionally so. She fondly recalls an upbringing that, at the time, caused her intense emotional pain and led her to suicidal behaviors. Readers may be shocked by several incidents—e.g., after she was caught stealing a figurine, her parents threatened to chop off her hand, her father going so far as to stand over her with a hatchet. The author has clearly channeled her painful memories into anger, and she blames White supremacy and institutionalized patriarchy for the social isolation of her youth. Chaudhry’s story, which includes such asides as her reasons for not wanting to have children (she includes a list of 12) and a chapter on hair, is occasionally difficult to track. Throughout, the author struggles with issues of self-identity and anger, rendering her emotions in a raw and candid style that sometimes meanders.

A mixture of troubling religious and cultural memories and the author’s pride in her heritage.