Shukairy, Ream. Next New Syrian Girl, The. Little, Brown, 03/2023. 409pp. Fiction. Trade $18.99. 978-0-316-43263-4. GRADES 8 – 12. OUTSTANDING.
High school senior Khadija Shaami thinks the challenges of balancing her passion for boxing and a “regular” high school with her Syrian mother’s exacting familial and social expectations is hard enough. But when refugee Leene Taher moves into her house, she realizes that life has room for even more complications. While two girls of a similar age who share Syrian roots might expect to share some common ground, the differences in their life experience—privilege and stability in the U.S. for one, and the deep horrors of violence and refugee life for the other—create a gap that seems impossible to bridge. But a shared love for their common culture and a determination to solve a mystery bring them together as collaborators and, ultimately, friends.
Lesley Mandros Bell—Unaffiliated