jinn – Cannonball Read 17

Hacker Adventure with a Kitty

Alif the Unseen by G. Willow Wilson

August 5, 2021 by CoffeeShopReader 1 Comment

Bingo 11 Book Club In preparation for CBR book club in September, I picked up Alif the Unseen; I chose this one since I’d already read one of the other options (The Bear and the Nightingale) and I picked up the other option off the library shelf, flipped through it, and decided ‘Nope, not my style, this writing would drive me nuts’. Having now read Alif the Unseen, I have to say, good job whoever suggested this. In some ways, the story reminded me of […]

An Islamic adventure story filled with djinn and revolution

March 25, 2015 by Valyruh Leave a Comment

This highly imaginative debut novel by an American-born convert to Muslim has garnered praise from all and sundry. Part fantasy, part mythology, part religious tract and part political tract, Alif the Unseen is as hard to pin down as it is fun to experience. It is the story of a young half-Arab/half-Indian man living in an unidentified Arab sheikdom known as “The City.” Alif (his “label”) is a computer hacker par excellence, and from his mother’s apartment is happy to sell his services to any […]

Tell Me, Princess, Now When Did You Last Clean off Your Hard Drive

January 25, 2015 by Quorren Leave a Comment

Alif the Unseen is a mess of a book, but in a good way. There is elements of cyberpunk, graciously borrowed from Neuromancer. There’s revolutionaries straight from today’s news stories. There’s teenager drama that would be right at home at Degrassi High. And underneath all of that is the Quran. Alif is a “grey hat”, which is what H4X0rz (sorry, I’m from the 90s, I had to) are calling themselves now, I guess. Alif’s clients needs to keep their sites of objectionable content up and out […]

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