Excerpt from A Woman Is No Man by Etaf Rum, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

It was a quiet morning. For a while they just sat there, lost in the view. Isra felt a shiver down her spine. She couldn't help but think of the jinn who lived in cemeteries and ruins. Growing up, Isra had heard countless stories of the supernatural creatures, who were said to possess humans. Many of the neighborhood women swore they had witnessed an evil presence near the two cemeteries. Isra muttered a quick prayer under her breath. She wondered if it was a bad omen, facing a graveyard as she sat with her husband for the first time.

Beside her Adam stared absently into the distance. What was he thinking? Why wouldn't he say something? Was he waiting for her to speak first? Surely he should speak first! She thought about the interactions between men and women she'd read about in books. Small introductions first, personal tales next, then affection grew. That was how two people fell in love. Or at least how Sinbad the Sailor fell in love with Princess Shera in A Thousand and One Nights. Except Shera was a bird for most of the story. Isra decided to be more realistic.

Adam turned to look at her. She swallowed, tugging on the edges of her hijab. His eyes lingered on the loose strands of black hair poking out from underneath. It occurred to her that he had not yet seen her hair. She waited for him to say something, but he only stared. His gaze moved up and down, his lips slowly parted. There was something in his eyes that troubled her. An intensity. What was it? In the glassy tint of his gaze, she could see the days of the rest of her life stacked together like pages. If only she could flip through them, so she knew what was to come.

Isra broke his gaze and returned her eyes to the graveyards. Perhaps he was only nervous, she told herself. Or perhaps he didn't like her. It was reasonable. After all, she had never been called beautiful. Her eyes were small and dark, her jaw angular. More than once, Mama had mocked her sharp features, saying her nose was long and pointed, her forehead too large. She was certain Adam was looking at her forehead now. She pulled on her hijab. Perhaps she should bring out the box of Mackintosh's chocolates Mama saved for special occasions. Or maybe she should brew some chai. She started to offer him some grapes but remembered they were not yet ripe.

As she turned to face Adam once more, she noticed his knees shaking. Then, in a flash, he zoomed closer and planted a kiss on her cheek.

Isra slapped him.

Shocked, she waited for him to apologize, to muster up something about how he hadn't meant to kiss her, how his body acted of its own accord. But he only looked away, face flushed, and buried his eyes between the graves.

With great effort, she forced herself to look at the cemeteries. She thought perhaps there was something between the graves she could not see, some secret to make sense of what was happening. She thought about A Thousand and One Nights, how Princess Shera had wanted to become human so she could marry Sindbad. Isra didn't understand. Why would anyone want to be a woman when she could be a bird?


"He tried to kiss me," Isra told Mama after Adam and his family left, whispering so Yacob wouldn't hear.

"What do you mean, he tried to kiss you?"

"He tried to kiss me, and I slapped him! I'm sorry, Mama. Everything happened so fast, and I didn't know what else to do." Isra's hands were shaking, and she placed them between her thighs.

"Good," Mama said after a long pause. "Make sure you don't let him touch you until after the wedding ceremony. We don't want this American family to go around saying we raised a sharmouta. That's what men do, you know. Always put the blame on the woman." Mama stuck out the tip of her pinkie. "Don't even give him a finger."

"No. Of course not!"

"Reputation is everything. Make sure he doesn't touch you again."

"Don't worry, Mama. I won't."

Excerpted from A Woman Is No Man by Etaf Rum. Copyright © 2019 by Etaf Rum. Excerpted by permission of Harper. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.