Reviews with content warning for Gore - Exit West

If taken at face value, Exit West is a portal fantasy akin to Every Heart A Doorway or Ten Thousand Doors of January. However, the story revolves around a couple Nadia and Saeed fleeing violence and civil war between militants and government forces in their unnamed home country which could be any number of countries - Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Syria, Lebanon etc. Nadia wears a chador to protect herself but underneath she is a badass riding a motorcycle and smoking hash, having trysts. (Actually, I'm not sure if it's a chador or niqab or burqa that Nadia wears, it's left deliberately vague in description). I’m always pleasantly surprised by Mohsin Hamid's female characters; by Mumtaz in Moth Smoke who defies the role of a nurturing mother and straight up detests motherhood and its constraints and by Nadia here who is the more sexually adventurous of the two and an all around courageous independent woman - no small task in a religious conservative country.

So this is a refugee story and while I enjoyed the stylistic elements and Mohsin's storytelling, I couldn't help thinking I'd be better off reading a non-fiction refugee story written by a refugee, such as Those We Throw Away Are Diamonds by Mondiant Dogon. Or by a writer once a refugee themselves like Dina Nayeri. This article written by a female Afghan refugee about seeking refuge in Britain as a child, for example, affected me greatly https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/20/new-lives-refugee-britain-afghanistan-asylum-uk-taliban

I don't think there's anyone with a neutral view about the migrant crisis, regardless of whether one lives in a host country or the one in turmoil. Mohsin Hamid's sympathy and compassion for his refugee characters as well as the pressing need to accord them dignity and humanity shines throughout. It is interesting that he has chosen to name the intake countries - Greece, Britain, US while keeping the Islamic country in chaos unnamed. People in reviews (likely British) have taken umbrage at the way nativist Britons were portrayed and their reaction to the migrant intruders appearing through doors and squatting on private property. Wasn't Brexit the result of xenophobia? The new nationality and borders bill from Priti Patel's office would penalize and criminalize asylum seekers arriving via an illegal route such as channel crossings in boats and no doubt, teleportation doors if they existed. Moreover, a clause in this bill absolves UK Border Force agents from any legal prosecution should their pushback missions result in refugee deaths. https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/oct/13/uk-border-force-could-be-given-immunity-over-refugee-deaths
Greece is already engaging in pushbacks and Turkey is following suit. Bangladesh has transferred and is still transferring Rohingya refugees onto a prison-like camp on flooding prone Bashan Char Island. The list is endless. So is Mohsin Hamid prescient as one of the blurbs suggest (this blurb specifically pertains to American reaction to refugees but really can be applied more widely)?

We are all migrants through time

What Exit West illustrates well are the more prosaic quotidian elements of being a refugee: the interminable waits and boredom while stuck in limbo, the value and paramount importance of simple 'luxuries' such as a hot shower in restoring a person's self even for a while (Nadia's scene in this was so powerful), the grating friction and changes in a relationship after having undergone this grueling dehumanizing process together, the tendency to create tribes and cling onto familiar fallbacks (in Saeed's case, prayer and congregating with fellow countrymen). This last one was particularly interesting to me; Nadia couldn't divest herself fast enough from the constricting patriarchal religious strictures which had governed her life in the old country whereas Saeed having suffered no such restrictions there hankered after the same teachings and regulations at the new place.

Content Warnings

gingerkathrynreads's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous challenging emotional hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

Content Warnings

More...