If You're Reading This by Trent Reedy

If You're Reading This is Reedy's fourth novel, which focuses on a young teen who begins receiving his dead father's letters written to him seven years earlier while he served in Afghanistan. His father, worried he might not survive his time in Afghanistan wrote letters so his son would have something to remember him. These letters motivate the young man to change his life and help him come to terms with his father's death years earlier and in doing so to help his family heal.

For fifteen-year-old Mike Wilson grade ten is starting out similar to the past seven years - without his father. His father Mark, died seven years ago on August 28, 2005 in Afghanistan, leaving behind Mike, his younger sister, Mary and his mom, Allison, who has never recovered from the loss of her husband. Mike is a good student who has left behind his football playing days to focus on academics. But now that he's in his sophomore year he's been thinking of returning to playing. At lunch one day, Coach Carter, also Mike's history teacher, tells him time is running out, that he's missed the first set of practices and that he needs to join before the first game on Friday.

Mike works on Derek Harris's farm, helping him with various chores. Mike tells Derek that he really wants to play football but that his mother won't allow him to join. Ever since his father's death, him mother has been overly protective. She works constantly, struggling to provide for Mike and Mary, and has given up on her dream of becoming a nurse.

Mike arrives home to thirteen-year-old  Mary telling him that a letter has arrived in mail for him. When Mike opens the letter he is astonished to discover that it is a letter from his father written when he first arrived in Afghanistan and to be sent to Michael only if he was killed in action and prior to his sixteenth birthday. The letter dated May 29, 2004 tells Mike about what his father did in the Army National Guard where he is a combat engineer, trained in battle tactics with the M16 and other weapons.  He writes that his buddy, Marcelo Ortiz has promised to deliver the letters to Mike. The first letter tells Mike a little about his father's teen years, partying at Nature Spot and giving him advice on high school. He gives Mike his first mission, to go for whatever it is he's been wanting to do. Mike sees this as his father telling him to go for the spot on the football team, so he fakes his mother's signature and hands in the form to Coach. Although his father's first letter mentions that his buddy Ortiz would send the letters, Mike discovers that Ortiz died the same day as his father meaning that someone else has taken on this task.

What follows is a series of five more letters dated from June 12, 2004 until Mike's birthday on September 22, 2004. Each letter reveals to Mike more about his father, who he was, how he met his mother and what he believes in. In each letter Mike's father sets out a mission for him to accomplish including doing something nice for his mother or sister, taking a chance on a girl he might like and working on getting a good mark in a school assignment.  His father also introduces him to the "cowboy way"  telling Mike,  "Out here  in the middle of nowhere, we've had to figure out how to handle things on our own, like cowboys on the range. We might not always be completely sure how to solve a problem or carry out a mission, but we do it anyway. It's the Cowboy Way." 

Besides joining the football team, his father's letters lead Mike to gradually figure out how to handle a bullying teammate, Nick Rhodes, who continues to confront Mike because he is chosen to replace him on the team. The letters also encourage him to take a chance on a relationship even though it might mean getting hurt. In Mike's case it is Isma Rafee, whose parents are from Iran and whose father teaches mathematics at the University of Iowa. He also tries to be patient with his overwhelmed mother who works at a nursing home and seems to be coping poorly with what happened seven years ago.

His father's letters create a sense of conflict in Mike and open more questions about his father. He feels he never really knew his father and it bothers him that he never knew how he died. Because the letters have revealed new things about his father, Mike is determined to find the mystery sender hoping this person will be able to fill in more of the gaps. Repeated online searches of those whom his father mentions in his letters turn up little information. Even a call to his father's old engineer company armory reveals few leads except that the mysterious sender of the letters wants to remain anonymous and is simply following the wishes of Mike's father. Sergeant Andrews who speaks with Mike tells him, "Everyone who knows what you want to know promised your father that we'd let you get through all his messages first, and we promised to let the man sending the letters do this his own way. In the Army, we keep promises..."

The last letter arrives as part of a huge package that contains four video clips. These video clips reveal some startling revelations including the final minutes on the base before his last mission and the identity of the mystery mailer. By the time Mike has watched all the videos his life is in chaos; he's been forced to quit the football team, his relationship with Isma has collapsed and he's being bullied by Nick Rhodes. When he talks to the mystery mailer, someone close to him, Mike learns how his father died. This leads Mike to the realization that he needs to confront his mother  and get her to talk about what happened to his father. He decides to use the Cowboy Way to help his family towards healing and forgiveness.

Discussion

Trent Reedy was an English teacher in Riverside, Iowa before his Iowa National Guard unit was sent to Afghanistan in 2004. He had joined the National Guard like many other Americans, to help pay for his college education. The call to war was both unexpected and frightening. While on deployment, his wife, Amanda, sent him a copy of Katherine Paterson's Bridge to Terabitha. This book helped Trent Reedy recover some of the hope that he would survive his term of active duty. Reedy corresponded with Paterson who encouraged him to follow his dream of becoming a writer and who helped him gain entrance to Vermont College of Fine Arts' writing program. 

If You're Reading This definitely showcases the strengths of Trent Reedy- his understanding of the life of a soldier, the struggles families of soldiers deployed overseas encounter and the sense of loss and the difficulty in coming to terms with the death of a soldier. Authors successfully write about those things they know well and this comes across in Reedy's novel with respect to army life.

Reedy uses the vehicle of the letters from Mark Wilson to his son Mike, to portray life for the American soldiers in Afghanistan during the "war on terror" and as the means to establish a relationship between father and son. With regard to the latter, occasionally, Mark's letters lacked authenticity and bordered on mundane. In one letter he writes, "Anyway that brings me to the first thing I guess I wanted to tell you. Always have a book going. Always take it with you. That way, if you get stuck someplace...." In another he tells his son about a first date with too much description that makes it seem awkward. The letters also seemed coincidentally to synchronize almost perfectly with what was going on in Mike's life when he read them. Yet for the most part the letters felt very realistic for example when his father tells him about fighting honourably, about respecting women, taking care of his mother and sister or when he encourages Mike to work hard in school.

Reedy has created in Mike a character with depth and honesty that feels genuine. He's already a fairly responsible teenager in contrast to his younger sister, Mary. While Mike cleans the house and has a part time job, Mary is more concerned with clothing, being with her friends and trying to blackmail her brother for money. Yet for all his good qualities, Mike undergoes considerable growth throughout the novel as he learns about his father, deals with new situations at school and a girlfriend.

At first Mike is struggling under the smothering blanket of his mother's over-protectiveness - which resulted in Mike leaving the one sport he really loves and is good at, football.  Desperate to be a part of school and to focus on something other than academics, Mike lies to his mom about what he's doing and  forges her signature on the permission form. But by the end of the novel he begins to recognize that in doing so he lacks the very integrity his father has encouraged him to have and one of the values Coach Carter has been working on with the team. He mans up, telling his mother who is furious at his lies. Nevertheless he maturely faces the consequences which involve more than just his mother's wrath, but also rejection from his teammates who don't know his reason for quitting. Overall Mike matures remarkably through the novel, helping his family work towards healing and also gradually learning that he has to defend the girl he likes, Isma, if he wants to continue his relationship with her.

Young male readers will love the exciting descriptions of the football practices and the games. Reedy manages to capture the tension during the games as well as the rivalry and camaraderie of the young players as they work towards creating a cohesive team. The dialogue between the teenage boys feels realistic, although maybe a bit sanitized, which is quite acceptable! Some readers may find that  novels moves a bit slowly in parts, but the author weaves the letters from Mike's father in often enough to keep interest high. Well written with an appealing cover.

Book Details:
If You're Reading This by Trent Reedy
New York: Arthur A. Levine Books, an imprint of Scholastic Inc.    2014
296 pp.

Words in the Dust by Trent Reedy

Every triumph from patience springs, 
The happy herald of better things...

Thirteen-year-old Zulaikha lives in the village of An Daral with her father, Sadiq Frouton,  his second wife Malehkah, her fifteen-year-old sister Zeynab, her nineteen-year-old brother Najib, and her half brothers, nine-year-old Khalid and two-year-old Habib. 

Malehkah is her father's second wife and is expecting another baby. Zulaikha's mother was always kind to Malehkah,  helping her to adjust to life in their family. Now Zulaikha's mother is dead (we learn her fate later on in the story) Malekhak is not kind to her. Zulaikha's life is hard as she has had the misfortune to have been born with a cleft palate. This disfiguration makes it difficult for her to eat and speak and has opened her to taunts from adults and children alike. Zulaikha not only feels disgusting and ugly, but also intense shame. Their home is An Daral is "a one-story mud brick house with five rooms" that her father has painted blue on the outside. 

The novel opens with Zulaikha walking to the bazaar to buy fresh naan. She's wearing a chador but when she uncovers her mouth to pay for the bread, the shopkeeper looks at her with disgust, quickly fills her order and orders her away so she won't scare off customers. On the way back to her home, Zulaikha is confronted by Anwar and his cousins, Omar and Salman, who taunt her about her mouth with its twisted teeth. Zulaikha's split upper lip makes it hard to speak properly and she also drools. The bullying by Anwar and his cousins stops when the American troops arrive in An Daral. 

At home Baba reveals that Hajji Abdullah told him about the arrival of the Americans, that they will pay good money for welders and that they want to open a new school, one that allows girls to attend. Zeynab is astonished at this but Melahkah seems interested. Baba doesn't care as long as the rich Americans pay for everything. Baba arrives home joyfully telling Zulaikha and her family that he has won the contract to add to the American's military base in Farah and to build a school for Afghan children. This means they will have money to buy a car and perhaps even buy a welding truck with equipment in the back. He is so excited at the prospect of increased wealth that he states he may even take another wife, something that does not please Zulaikha.

Zulaikha is sent again to the market to get rice oranges and bananas and ask Khalid to come home. After making her purchases, Zulaikha finds Khalid scaling the wall of the old Citadel, a rock fortress that has existed for centuries. He is being harassed by Anwar and his cousins. Zulaikha helps Khalid out of a difficult climb but then they are chased by a policeman on the Citadel. While Khalid escapes, Zulaikha is only saved by an older woman who pulls her into her house. 

That woman tells Zulaikha her name is Meena and before the Russians and then the Taliban, she was a professor of literature at the university in Herat. When the Russians came, they leveled Herat and Meena and her husband Masoud fled to An Daral. After the war, during the Taliban years, Meena ran a clandestine study group for men and women who loved literature and the ancient Afghan poets.  Zulaikha remembers that there were strangers in her home reading books.  Zulaikha refers to herself as only a girl and that she is not beautiful but Meena responds that her beloved mother adored the great Sufi poet, Jami and his famous poem, Yusuf and Zulaikha.  Zulaikha remembers her mother teaching her to read but because her mother died when she was four years old, she can only remember a few words. Meena tells Zulaikha that she doesn't know about Afghan poets Firdawi, Jami, Hafez and Abdullah Ansari. Zulaikha knows only war. Meena recites a verse from Yusuf and Zulaikha, telling Zulaikha that her mother could remember many verses and wanted to memories the entire book so the Taliban couldn't take it from her.

When Zulaikha asks her to teach her to read, Meena agrees. Before Zulaikha leaves her house, Meena gives her a scrap of paper with the Dari alphabet written on it. In order to practice the  alphabet she has been taught, Zulaikha, practices writing in the dirt - hence the title of the book. Howeever, Zulaikha finds it a struggle to visit Meena and also difficult to practice the alphabet because she has so many chores.

The following week, Zulaikha is taken by Najib to the American soldiers at the construction site where Baba is working. There she recognizes the African-American soldier who saw her face from his tank when he entered An Daral.  Zulaikha meets Captain Mindy Edmanton, a medical officer who asks to see Zulaikha's mouth. Reluctantly but urged on by Baba, Zulaikha lowers her chador, revealing her split lip and twisted teeth. Captain edmanton takes a picture of her mouth. Zulaikha is shocked at the American woman's behaviour, shaking hands with the Afghan men and ordering the American men soldiers around. 

When the Americans leave, Najib questions Baba as to what the Americans want. He tells zulaikha that the Americans want to fix her mouth and that if their doctor in Kandahar believes he can fix her mouth they will do the operation for free. Zulaikha is stunned at this news but Najib is happy and Baba tells her he will make all the arrangements. 

Shortly after this Zeynab learns that she is to be married off, at fifteen, to Tahir, Abdullah Hajji's younger brother. Both Zeynab and Zuliakha are stunned as they did not expect this to happen so soon. Tahir is forty-five years old and he already has two wives. Zeynab will be his third and youngest wife. The marriage is to be held in three weeks and then Zeynab will move to Farah where Tahir lives. A week later Malehkah hosts the shirnee-khoree which sees many women attend, including Hajji Abdullah's first wife Gulzoma, but Tahir's wives, Leena and Belquis are strangely absent. The shirnee-khoree is upsetting to Zuliakha who has to endure comments by Gulzoma about her mouth. 

After the shirnee-khoree, Zuliakha is able to visit Meena and is given a verse from Firdawsi's epic poem, Shahnameh to memorize and copy. Baba tells Zulaikha that he will drive her to Farah and then the two of them will take an American military helicopter to Kandahar where she will have the surgery on her mouth. A week later Zuliakha and Baba drive in their white Toyota to the American base in Farah where they once again meet the interpreter, Shiaraqa, Corporal Andrews the African-American soldier who saw Zuliakha, and Captain Mindy. Unfortunately, the American helicopter cannot flyout of Kandhar and Zulaikha and her father must leave to return home. Baba is furious as he's taken time off work but Zulaikha is devastated. At home she weeps for her lost opportunity and recalls the brutal murder by the Taliban of her mother who loved Persian poetry so very much.

Several weeks later, after the marriage of Zeynab to Tahir, Zuliakha is able to travel to Kandahar to get her cleft lip repaired. This time she travels with Najib and they have their first ride in a huge American helicopter. Zuliakha meets with Dr.  and has the operation. After a day in the hospital she returns home to an ecstatic Baba. Life goes on at home with Zulaikha healing and now able to eat properly. With Zeynab gone, most of the household chores fall to Zulaikha. Eventually she visits Meena who tells her that she has applied to be a teacher at the new school in An Daral and was hired by her friend who works for the new Department of Education. Since Meena will be teaching she will not be able to teach Zulaikha. However her friend is so impressed with Zulaikha's story that she has offered to tutor her in Herat so that Zulaikha can get caught up and possibly apply for entrance to university. Meena suggests that Zulaikha could then become a teacher at a school or even university in Kabul or Herat. While Zulaikha believes her Baba will never agree to this, Meena encourages her to at least ask, as Afghanistan is changing.

One her way home from Meena's, Zulaikha has a surprise encounter with Zeynab who is in An Daral with her husband Tahir. Although she tells Zulaikha that her marriage is fine, Zeynab's unkempt appearance and her distracted manner suggest that something is not right. When she leaves, Zulaikha believes her sister is actually saying a final goodbye to her. Baba refuses to allow Zulaikha to visit Zeynab in Farah. What happens to Zeynab changes Zulaikha's life forever.

Discussion

Words in the Dust is set in Afghanistan in 2005, during the invasion of the country by the United States after the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. The novel is based on a real young girl Trent Reedy encountered while serving in western Afghanistan with the United States army. It was at this time that he met a young Afghan girl named Zulaikha who had a cleft palate. "My unit was on a mission to make contact with the elders of a village north of Farah. Our commanders wanted to ask the elders if there was any way the Americans could help improve the village. On this mission, one of the soldiers saw a young girl with a cleft lip. ...In addition her nose was disfigured  and her upper set of teeth were badly crooked, some sticking out almost straight forward. " Reedy noted that not only would this surgery in Afghanistan be very expensive but also under the Taliban rule, this young girl would not have been allowed to see a male doctor. On a second mission to the village his unit's chief military officer was able to locate the Afghan girl whose name was Zulaikha. Reedy and his fellow soldiers pooled their money together to pay transport to the US airbase at Bagram, where a military doctor did the surgery for free. Inspired by Zualiakha's quiet courage and now understanding the obstacles girls and women face in Afghanistan, Reedy promised to write about her. In his Author's Note at the back of the novel, Reedy admits that while he is neither an Afghani nor a girl, he felt compelled to write her story, recognizing that in Afghanistan the majority of women are illiterate. 

To help readers place the events in the novel into a historical context, a brief history of recent events in Afghanistan would have helped. In 1978, Afghanistan came under Soviet influence with the bloody coup that saw the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA) seize power and form the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan. By 1979, Afghanistan, once a peaceful country, was now embroiled in civil war. Nur Mohammad Taraki who had led the country was assassinated and conditions deteriorated further, leading to the Soviet invasion in 1979. This led to the Soviet-Afghan war which lasted nine years, until the withdrawal of Soviet troops in 1988. In 1994, the Taliban rose to prominence, having been supported by the Islamic madrassas in Pakistan as well as by the United States. It was this support that would come back to haunt the Americans. The Taliban took control of Afghanistan in 1996 and established an Islamic emirate enforcing a strict interpretation of Islamic sharia law. The Taliban treated people, especially women brutally. Under the Taliban, women were required to wear a full burqa, were unable to access health care and education and were not allowed to work. Women who help positions in government and education had to leave their jobs and were confined to home. Society became highly segregated, with men and women having separate areas at public events and in public buildings.

After the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States, America invaded Afghanistan in October 2001 hoping to capture Osama Bin Laden who was responsible for the attacks. The Americans were able to drive out the Taliban by December 2001, most of whom fled into the mountainous regions of Afghanistan or into Pakistan. Hamid Karzai became president of Afghanistan in 2002. During the period of 2002 to 2005, the Taliban reorganized and began to attack US forces and their allies. It is the end of this period that provides the setting of the novel.

The brutality of the previous Taliban regime is portrayed in the novel when Zulaikha recalls the murder of her mother by the Taliban. Books other than the Quran were banned during the Taliban reign and so Meena, a former literature professor at the university in Herat organized a secret book group for women. Zulaikha's mother was part of Meena's group who studied the works of famous Persian poets. Somehow the Taliban came to know that Zulaikha's mother had banned books. The Taliban broke into Zulaikha's home, beat her father, burned the offending books and murdered her mother after beating her.  Zulaikha is well aware that even though the Taliban are gone, any learning or reading of literature must be done in secret. She doesn't tell even her own family that she is secretly meeting Meena. She later learns, after Zeynab's murder, that it was her father's second wife, Malekah who, by deliberately sending Zulaikha on errands gave her the opportunity to meet with Meena. Later she tells Zulaikha she did this because she felt there had to be something better than just being married off.

However, Islamic law still remains in Afghanistan in 2005. Girls cannot attend school. Women do not work, must wear a chadri, cannot be in the company of men who are unrelated to them, and are strictly segregated. However, the presence of the Americans is gradually bringing about change: Baba is helping to build a new school for girls in An Daral, and women like Meena are being allowed back into teaching. The novel serves to highlight the huge cultural difference between the Americans with their women  soldiers who command troops and work as medics and the Afghanis whose women are illiterate and kept hidden.

Through the character of Zulaikha, Reedy introduces his readers to the literature of Persia. Meena tells Zulaikha her name comes from the poem Yusuf and Zulaikha written by Jami. Although Meena doesn't elaborate on it, this story is found in the Bible and the Qu'ran and is about Joseph who was living in the house of the Egyptian, Potiphar and whose unnamed wife attempted to seduce him. In the Bible the story is about Joseph's (Yusuf's) heroic virtue and Potiphar's wife's betrayal. Meena also introduces Zulaikha to Shahnameh (The Book of Kings), an epic poem written by the Persian poet Firdawsi. This epic poem touches Zuliakha deeply. "I looked down at the words I'd written on the paper. Words that were at once a thousand years old and yet completely new."

Words In the Dust also explores the problem of domestic violence within Afghan families. In Afghanistan culture, the lives of women are strictly controlled by men and a culture of honour. One issue explored is the practice of "bride burning" - a practice common in India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. Young brides are murdered because they are unwanted for various reasons: an insufficient dowry, inability to conceive or any other reason deemed sufficient. Often a young wife is taken to hospital with severe burns and family, police and medical personnel are told the young wife was injured by an exploding gas stove. However, the burns are extensive, very severe and not consistent with this kind of "accident". If the victim doesn't die, they are often terribly mutiliated.

In Words in the Dust, Zeynab is a victim of this type of domestic violence. Zulaikha's earlier encounter with Zeynab reveals that all is not well in her marriage to Tahir. Zeynab shows signs of abuse. Her normally clean and well made up appearance is in stark contrast to what Zulaikha sees, "...there were dark circles under her bloodshot eyes and her lips were dry and cracked..." Zulaikha notes that Zeynab's beautiful hair is matted and  dusty. Zeynab tells her that Tahir wants her to have a son but that she is uncertain - suggesting that she is having trouble conceiving, even though she's only been married a short time. In the hospital at Farah, a badly burned and dying Zeynab states again that it was Tahir who says she cannot have a baby. Tahir refuses to allow the Americans to take Zeynab to their hospital and she dies. Although the American medical officer Captain Mindy Edmanston is aware of what has happened, Zulaikha says nothing. Tahir tells Zulaikha that the American woman, "She doesn't understand. She knows nothing. These things happen."  but Zulaikha observes that Tahir hasn't cried and seems indifferent to Zeynab's death. "My sister was only one of his wives. He had two others. He was a rich man and could marry again." 

Zeynab's circumstances serve to highlight not only domestic violence and the practice of bride burning but also child marriage. She was married at age fifteen to a much older man. The marriage was arranged by her father, not for care of Zeynab but to form an alliance with a wealthy man without consideration for his character. Zeynab had no say in the marriage, which she was conditioned by her culture to accept, without seeing her prospective husband and without even being present when the marriage was contracted.

The Taliban and cultural acceptance that a husband can physically beat his wife is shown when Baba strikes Malehkah across the face, breaking her nose and causing her to fall and hit her head on the concrete floor. Later on, Baba returns to his home but his apology is not really one, but a statement that shows he has the right to hit his wife. "Malehkah, please forgive me. I should not have hit you so hard." 

Overall Words in the Dust is an engaging and well written novel. Younger readers should be cautioned that the description of Zeynab's injuries are very graphic and may be unsettling. This was not really necessary in a novel for younger readers. Older teens may find the frequent quotes from the poet Jami's work, Yusuf and Zualikha fascinating and want to read parts or all of the poem. This work can be found in partial form online through google books.

Trent Reedy, who was a member of the Iowa Army National Guard, was called up for active duty in Afghanistan in 2004 and spent a year serving overseas. While overseas, he became convinced that he would love to write books for children. Upon his return to the United States, Reedy received a MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts. 

Book Details:
Words in the Dust by Trent Reedy
Arthur A. Levine Books  2011
266 pp.