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A review by corsetedfeminist
Hijab Butch Blues by Lamya H
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
fast-paced
5.0
My hold for this book came in last night and I thought, “Oh, I’ll read a few chapters before I go to bed.”
That sound you hear is the universe cackling at me.
This book wrecked me. It made me laugh, it made me cry. And then cry again. Okay, I cried a lot. Mostly good tears.
I read the whole thing and finished at 1am.
This book is a beautiful but pointedly honest story of the author’s life, interweaving themes of queerness and Islam and her experiences as a brown person with stories from the Quran that illustrate the point at hand.
This is the first book I’ve read since deconstructing my own faith that embraced religion, and while it did not change my beliefs, it still healed part of my soul to see in print someone who could be so deeply religious and queer at the same time, taking back her own religion’s stories.
Her descriptions of navigating queerness and other people’s religion, especially her family and Muslim friends, was incredibly familiar to me as someone living in the rural south with a very Christian family- especially her discussion of how flippant and reductive we can be when encouraging people to just come out and potentially cut off their family.
Her discussions of her gender and sexuality awakenings were honest and once again far too relatable, especially from one gender non-conforming lesbian to another.
Over all, this book is both beauty and protest, all wrapped up in one, leaving the reader with a hopeful perspective about everything, despite having our illusions of equality and acceptance challenged. Its perspective on the intersection of faith, race, immigration, gender, and sexuality is unmatched and begs for an audience.
That sound you hear is the universe cackling at me.
This book wrecked me. It made me laugh, it made me cry. And then cry again. Okay, I cried a lot. Mostly good tears.
I read the whole thing and finished at 1am.
This book is a beautiful but pointedly honest story of the author’s life, interweaving themes of queerness and Islam and her experiences as a brown person with stories from the Quran that illustrate the point at hand.
This is the first book I’ve read since deconstructing my own faith that embraced religion, and while it did not change my beliefs, it still healed part of my soul to see in print someone who could be so deeply religious and queer at the same time, taking back her own religion’s stories.
Her descriptions of navigating queerness and other people’s religion, especially her family and Muslim friends, was incredibly familiar to me as someone living in the rural south with a very Christian family- especially her discussion of how flippant and reductive we can be when encouraging people to just come out and potentially cut off their family.
Her discussions of her gender and sexuality awakenings were honest and once again far too relatable, especially from one gender non-conforming lesbian to another.
Over all, this book is both beauty and protest, all wrapped up in one, leaving the reader with a hopeful perspective about everything, despite having our illusions of equality and acceptance challenged. Its perspective on the intersection of faith, race, immigration, gender, and sexuality is unmatched and begs for an audience.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Homophobia, Misogyny, Racism, and Xenophobia