Review Detail

This is the kind of topic you see in shows like Taboo. This is the kind of book my mom would not be happy to find me reading. I don’t know about the laws of sex reassignment where I live but the issue of same-sex love is still kept under wraps. I’ve read my share of GLBT literature, but I’m still confused about this book.

The main theme would undoubtedly be being gay in a country where it is illegal to be gay. If anyone finds out about your sexual orientation, you’re dead. Seriously. As in you’d be hanging in the middle of town square with a thousand people looking at you and whispering to each other about the shame you have brought upon your family. This is not hard for me to imagine, things would probably take a similar turn in Pakistan (except for maybe the killing in town square part).

Kudos to Sara Farizan for coming up with such a brilliant plot. I would have given a higher rating if the execution had been just as good.

The weird thing is, I hated the two main characters of the story, Sahar and Nasrin. Sahar was an extremely negative character and it seemed as if she hated her partner most of the time. Nasrin, on the other hand, was selfish. Too spoiled to even think of losing the comforts life had provided her with.

I did like Sahar’s cousin Ali and her transsexual friend Parvin though. The characters in If You Could be Mine are very well fleshed out. Even the minor characters are very dimensional and not just flat fillers.

The ending was extremely realistic, thank God for that.

Final Words:
If You Could Be Mine is a book that had a lot of potential, and only a little of it was tapped. That said, it was interesting and wasn’t unrealistic at all. I sort of enjoyed it. Sort of.