A review by valje
The Beauty of Your Face: One Woman's Life in a Nation at Odds with Its Ideals by Sahar Mustafah

challenging emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

 This just wasn't quite a 4* read for me. It was a novel where I thought the writer took on a bit too much and I wonder whether more was originally written and then edited out. I would have liked to have heard more about what happened to Nada, particularly as her absence took up such a large part of the novel. From what I can recall from Afaf's perspective, life only got difficult after Nada disappeared.