You Truly Assumed

Sabreen illuminates the often-overlooked perspectives of Black Muslim teen girls in this emotionally charged debut. Sabriya Siddiq is one of only two Black ballet dancers in her school’s advanced pointe class. She has spent a year preparing for a summer ballet intensive, but her dream and well-being are put at risk when a terrorist bombs a Washington, D.C., Metro station, and the perpetrator is incorrectly assumed to be Muslim, eliciting a sharp rise in Islamophobia across the country. After Sabriya accidentally posts her feelings about the bombing publicly, resulting in a viral blog she names You Truly Assumed, she bonds online with sheltered hijabi artist Zakat Umar and savvy computer science maven Farah Rafiq, who help run it. As it grows in popularity, the blog attracts Muslim young women globally, as well as an increasingly dangerous spate of alt-right visitors who threaten the teens’ peace on, and off, the internet. Despite a concept somewhat dated by the inclusion of blogs, Sabreen skillfully renders three inquisitive, if frequently naive, young women as distinctly characterized as they are united in purpose and faith. Through their alternating voices, she succeeds in relating the frustrating reality of having a part of one’s identity acknowledged at the expense of another, and the resilience and love required to persist despite unfounded hate. Ages 13–up. Agent: Kat Kerr, Donald Maass Literary. (Feb.)