Sing to the Western Wind - by Tariq Mehmood (Paperback)

About the Book

"A suicide bombing is being planned in Manchester, and Saleem Khan, an atheist, seventy years of age, is carrying the bomb. Also concealed on his person is a cache of vivid, haunting memories - some of regret and yearning, some humorous, others overshadowed by the brutality of war. Award-winning novelist Tariq Mehmood plunges the reader into the dizzying saga of Saleem's incendiary history. This is a complex, vibrant novel about a man in extemis and the forces that drive him to the ultimate act of desperation"--

Book Synopsis

A complex, vibrant novel about a man in extremis, and the forces that drive him to the ultimate act of desperation

A suicide bombing is being planned in Manchester, and Saleem Khan, an atheist, seventy years of age, is carrying the bomb. Also concealed on his person is a cache of vivid, haunting memories - some of regret and yearning, some humorous, others over-shadowed by the brutality of war. Award-winning novelist Tariq Mehmood plunges the reader into the dizzying saga of Saleem's incendiary history.

In the 1960s, he left his lover, his job as a teacher and his home in rural Pakistan and emigrated to Bradford, a town crackling with racism. He found a job in a mill on an all-Asian night shift. He became an active trade unionist and later, when the mills closed down, drove a taxi. But inevitably he is impelled to return to Pakistan.

From Pakistan, Saleem is drawn across the border into the killing fields of Afghanistan. Among Russian soldiers and the holy warriors of the Mujahadeen, he meets Gulzarina, the woman whose life and experiences promise to make sense of Saleem's own tortuous history.

Review Quotes

"The author's and the characters' acute self-awareness of the familiarity of the plot, and their insistence on stressing the nuances of Saleem's journey rather than the gravity of its end, that make for a compelling read."
--Kohl Journal

"In reflective prose, Tariq Mehmood's kaleidoscopic novel unravels the life of man driven to the brink by political and religious violence...unflinching Sing to the Western Wind covers the human costs of imperial war in Pakistan, showing how innocence can be transformed into extremity through unjust violence: 'sometimes, even doves are slaughtered for the crime of singing.'"
--Foreword Reviews

"It's a harrowing story, and the book is full of gripping tension ... Mehmood writes about people with a tenderness and patience that is the mark of all talented novelists."
--James Folta, Lit Hub

About the Author

TARIQ MEHMOOD is an award-winning novelist and documentary filmmaker. His first novel, Hand on the Sun, was about a young immigrant to the UK experiencing racism in the 1970s and '80s. He is the Co-director of the multiple-award-winning documentary Injustice, which is about people who have died in British police custody. Mehmood teaches at the American University of Beirut.