Anwar Saleem, the focus of Tanwi Nandini Islam's Bright Lines, is as settled into Brooklyn, N.Y., as anyone could be. He runs his apothecary while his wife, Hashi, owns a beauty salon. They live in a renovated brownstone between Fort Greene and Bedford-Stuyvesant, in an area "now being called Clinton Hill." And their two daughters--one a flirtatious teenager and the other a college student who inherited Anwar's passion for plants--fill their home with youthful energy. This sense of blooming life seems to spill out into the streets, where "children ran through an unleashed fire hydrant, hopscotch chalk erased in the wasteful gush of water." It's a colorful, vibrant world that Bright Lines invites readers to step into and enjoy.
Despite his strong new roots, Anwar is haunted by the memories of living through the atrocities of the 1971 war in Bangladesh. Having lost his brother-in-law (also his closest friend) in the violence, Anwar adopted the man's daughter. Ella, now in her first year of college, has come to resemble her biological father more than ever. As Anwar watches Ella and his youngest daughter, Charu, grow into adults, both consumed with the standard anxieties of young people in the United States, Anwar finds himself wishing he could communicate to them everything he's been through. He knows there's a gaping distance between his memories and their reality--the question is how to cross it, and whether he should even try. --Annie Atherton