A while back Shaun Randol invited me to contribute to ‘The Mantle’. I am so pleased to finally be doing that. Here is my review for ‘The Mantle’ of Qanta Ahmed’s memoir ‘In the Land of Invisible Women: A Female Doctor’s Journey in the Saudi Kingdom.’
“The U.S. cover of Qanta Ahmed’s memoir In the Land of Invisible Women features a woman’s head shrouded in a black headdress against minarets and skies. I can’t help but wonder, since the subtitle is A Female Doctor’s Journey in the Saudi Kingdom, whether it might have made more sense for the cover to show a woman with a stethoscope against a Saudi hospital, or an operating room; that is, a cover that better reflected the memoir’s subtitle, rather than the usual clichéd woman in a veil. Because I wanted to read something other than an exposé on the subjugation of women in Saudi Arabia, it was with some reluctance that I took a chance on the book.
My chance proved to be illuminating, if not entirely satisfactory.read rest here“
Soniah Kamal 