Just before school got out in late-June, I discovered I Am Nujood in our storage room of class set books. Curious, I checked out a copy of I Am Nujood to read over summer break.
Author: Nujood Ali, Delphine Minoui
Genre: nonfiction, memoir
Setting: Yemen, 2008
Themes: child marriage, escape, poverty, patriarchal society, rape, abuse
Recommended for: upper-HS, adults
Starred Reviews: no starred reviews
“I’m a simple village girl who has always obeyed the orders of my father and brothers. Since forever, I have learned to say yes to everything. Today I have decided to say no.”
Nujood Ali’s childhood came to an abrupt end in 2008 when her father arranged for her to be married to a man three times her age. With harrowing directness, Nujood tells of abuse at her husband’s hands and of her daring escape.
With the help of local advocates and the press, Nujood obtained her freedom–an extraordinary achievement in Yemen, where almost half of all girls are married under the legal age. Nujood’s courageous defiance of both Yemeni customs and her own family has inspired other young girls in the Middle East to challenge their marriages.
Hers is an unforgettable story of tragedy, triumph, and courage.
I can’t say that I really loved this book, but I do think it is an important read. The world is not always a nice place, and modern teens (the ones you and I teach and know) truly need to understand that their lives are nothing like those of teens in other parts of the world. The more people know about girls like Nujood, the more help child brides can get.
Nujood’s parents, particularly her father, really made me angry. How is it that Nujood had so many important people helping her – people like her lawyer, the judge, Hilary Clinton, Katie Couric – and yet she still ended up living with her father again? Her father should have gotten some serious jail time, and I didn’t really understand why he and Nujood’s husband got off practically scott-free.
I appreciate that Nujood kept her positivity and spirit throughout her ordeal, but the “voice” of Nujood makes it sound like Nujood was really perfect and not too bitter or angry with her situation.
I wish the book had spent some time exploring Nujood’s emotions while she was married and the humongous obstacles she must have faced in escaping and asking for a divorce. It just didn’t sound as difficult or perilous as it surely must have been.
On a separate note: Today, Nujood’s father continues to exploit her since her divorce. Her publisher arranged to pay Nujood’s family $1000/month to help further Nujood’s education. But according to a 2013 article in The Guardian, Nujood’s father has kept this money for himself. Nujood did not finish her education and is now married with young children of her own.
This is a great discussion piece for an upper-high school classroom. Despite its positivity toward Nujood’s education and dream of becoming a lawyer, her real life hasn’t turned out the way one might hope. What an interesting discussion for a high school classroom.
We have it as class sets.
