Season 10, Episode 206 Huda F Cares with guest Huda Fahmy
This week we talk to Huda Fahmy, a graphic novelist whose 4th book Huda F Cares? was a finalist for the 2023 National Book Award in Young People’s Literature. Her book focuses on a teenage Muslim girl named Huda who takes a road trip in the family’s station wagon from Michigan to Florida to visit Disneyworld with her parents and many sisters. There she grapples with wanting to fit in with her peers but also wanting to stay true to her family and her Muslim religion with issues like wearing her hijab and praying in public.
The character Huda in her book is based on the author’s experience growing up in an Egyptian family that immigrated to the US. Huda talks about her love of comics and how she picked up English in part by reading Garfield comic books. Huda began writing graphic novels at the age of 30 when two of her sisters encouraged her to turn her essays of Muslim American life into illustrated stories.
Books mentioned in This Episode:
1- Huda F Cares? by Huda Fahmy
2- Huda F Are You? by Huda Fahmy
3- Yes, I'm Hot in This by Huda Fahmy
4- Huda F Wants To Know by Huda Fahmy
5- That Can be Arranged by Huda Fahmy
6- Murder by Degrees by Rita Mukerji
7- Hide by Tracy Clark
8- Graveyard of Lost Children by Katrina Monroe
9- Erasure by Percival Everett
10- Mexikid by Pedro Martin
11- American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang
12- Brave by Svetlana Chmakova
13- It Won't Always Be Like This by Malaka Gharib
14- Love From A to Z by S.K. Ali
15- All My Rage by Sabaa Tahir
16- A Tempest of Tea by Hafsah Faizal
17- As Long as the Lemon Trees Grow by Zoulfa Katouh
18- The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Juno Diaz
19- Hidden Systems by Dan Nott
20- The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton
21- Checkmate by Ali Hazelwood
22- Lady in the Lake by Laura Lippman
23- The Extraordinary Life of Sam Hell by Robert Dugoni
24- The Falconer by Elizabeth May
Shows/Films mentioned--
1- Poor Things (2023)
2- American Fiction (2023)
3- The Old Man and the Pool (Netflix 2023)