Home Fire

In the opening chapters of the novel, the readers learn about Isma and her complicated relationships with her family members. Orphaned early and the oldest of three siblings, Isma is responsible and caring, but her younger brother and sister sometimes find Isma’s love intrusive and overbearing. Isma’s decision to leave her family in the UK and move to the USA for a PhD program symbolizes her willingness to give her younger sister, Aneeka, more space, and her desire to pursue a career that she had to postpone to raise her orphaned siblings. At the same time, Isma’s hesitation about leaving Aneeka testifies to her fear of losing the bond they share and her unwillingness to give up control over her sister’s life.

The relationships between two sisters deteriorate sharply when Aneeka finds out that Isma was the one who informed the British authorities about their brother’s decision to join ISIS. On the one hand, Isma’s decision was well-intentioned: She realized what consequences her brother’s decision might have on the rest of the family, and she wanted to protect herself and her sister. On the other hand, Aneeka sees her sister’s decision as nothing short of treason because, in Aneeka’s eyes, family can’t turn their backs on each other no matter the circumstances. While Aneeka tends to simplify her brother’s choice, Isma equates Parvaiz’s decision to join ISIS with their father’s decision to abandon his family and become a jihadist.

Aneeka, contrarily, insists that “Parvaiz is not [their] father” (53) and that he is an extension of her. This gap in the sisters’ attitude toward their brother makes Isma realize that Aneeka and Parvaiz, as twins, share an unbreakable bond, and that their hearts are “synchronized, first with each other and then with the sound of the train pulling out of Preston Road station” (59). Growing up, the twins have become so connected to each other and to their geography that Parvaiz’s leaving symbolizes the severing of ties with both his family members and his homeland.

As someone who has to live in the aftermath of her father’s and her brother’s decision to become extremists, Isma realizes what kind of constraints her family background places on her. Moreover, the opening scene of the novel, which unfolds at the Heathrow airport, highlights the complexity and the fragility of Isma’s situation as a British Muslim woman. Although she was born in the UK, and “there was no other country of which she feels herself a part” (9), she is treated differently than an average UK citizen. Her detention foregrounds the racial profiling that many people of color face. Isma, as a hijab-wearing Muslim of Pakistani origin, inevitably becomes a suspect in the eyes of airport personnel, and the interrogation that follows unveils the prejudice she faces based on her appearance and religion.

Even though the lengthy questioning irritates Isma and makes her miss her flight, she keeps her emotions under control and abstains from anything that might make the airport security more suspicious. Because she had to take on the role of caretaker early in life, she learned to be reasonable and composed under all circumstances: Although she feels humiliated and angry at the security personnel “whose thumbprints were on [Isma’s] underwear” (11), she doesn’t let her feelings show and instead thanks them without “a shade of sarcasm” (11).

Isma’s conservative upbringing and adherence to her religion are further highlighted in contrast with Eamonn, a man of Pakistani origin whose family is “from a Muslim background” (44), as though Muslimness is something one can remove oneself from. Isma’s encounter with Eamonn in the first chapter demonstrates that even though they are both children of Muslim immigrants and grew up in London, their lives couldn’t be more different. After Isma’s father abandoned his family to join the jihadists, and her mother died when the girl was only 19, Isma didn’t have another choice but to work hard to raise her two younger siblings and to provide for them. Eamonn, on the other hand, grew up in an affluent family and, unlike Isma, who never knew what to say when people asked about her father, was proud of his ancestry.

What also sets them apart is their attitude towards religion. Eamonn’s secular upbringing becomes apparent when he asks, jokingly, “cancer or Islam—which is the greater affliction?” (28), demonstrating that he sees a Muslim background as a kind of curse. Although Isma understands that he was trying to make a joke, she finds his words derogatory and retorts that she finds it more difficult “to not be Muslim” (28). Therefore, Isma, a devoted Muslim who adheres to the rules of her religion both in her behavior and in her looks, views the world through the prism of her faith. Eamonn, who grew up in a family who abandoned their Muslim roots to make a public demonstration that they had integrated, considers religiousness a hindrance rather than a foothold.