Rebels by Accident by Patricia Dunn (AKA T.M. DUNN)

Luckily, her grandmother turns out to be an incredibly warm and interesting woman who teaches Mariam about life and love and to be proud of her ancestry. But while Deanna excitedly prepares for their journey by studying travel books and practicing Arabic with Baba (Mariam’s father), Mariam dreads the idea of living with her sittu, whose “iron fist” she grew up fearing. And, in the only unrealistic plot point in the book, Deanna’s mother decides to send her along as well. As a consequence, Mariam’s parents decide to send their daughter to Egypt to live with her sittu (grandmother). At the start of the book, the duo make a rare party appearance that winds up landing them and the rest of their high school class in jail for underage drinking and the presence of marijuana. She’s from a single-parent home (she has a “sperm donor” for a father) and contends with a facial deformity that doesn’t allow her to smile.

Mariam, a strong but lost 15-year-old, clutches to her sole friend, the bright and outspoken Deanna. In her debut novel, journalist Dunn tells an ambitious and winning coming-of-age story about an American teenager born to Egyptian parents.īeing a teenager probably wasn’t a cakewalk for any of us, but when you’re a first generation Egyptian-American living in post-9/11 New York, no one can blame you for having a bit of an identity crisis.

Rebels by Accident by Patricia Dunn (AKA T.M. DUNN)