It’s best to go into Patmeena Sabit’s debut novel, Good People, with very little besides the vagaries of the jacket copy:
“Zorah Sharaf could do no wrong. Zorah Sharaf brought shame upon her family. What’s the truth? Depends on who you ask.”
We learn through a kaleidoscope of oral-history-style narration, that the story centers on the Sharaf family. The family immigrated to the U.S. from Afghanistan more than 20 years earlier with little more than the clothes they were wearing, but patriarch Rahmat Sharaf worked his way into financial and social success.
The family maintains connections to the Afghan community in their Virginia town even as they personify the American dream. They live in an exclusive neighborhood. Zorah Sharaf and her older brother, Omer, attend the best schools. Their father wants them to advance to top-notch colleges and become even more successful than him. And then Zorah begins to rebel against her culture and brings shame to her family.
I’m going to stop there with the major plot points, because the joy of this novel is the way Sabit unpacks the story and reveals information little by little, from a cacophony of voices that range from friends and neighbors to school officials and newspaper articles. Interestingly, none of the accounts are from the family members themselves.
For much of the first part of the novel, we know something tragic has happened, but we don’t know exactly what. The author uses a varied timeline and the aforementioned choir of narrators to build suspense and keep us turning those pages.
Fans of Liz Moore’s “The God of the Woods” will love this novel, which is another literary mystery-thriller that keeps you wondering and guessing until its final pages. With ultra-short chapters and well-timed cliffhangers, Sabit paints a portrait of an immigrant family dealing with the pressures of preserving their culture while also trying to fit in. It is a master study in how the same collection of facts can be interpreted in vastly different — and even opposite — ways.
It’s hard to talk about Good People without revealing too many plot points, and you really should experience it by just trusting Sabit’s masterful writing and letting her guide you through. It’s a crime mystery that also speaks to issues of gossip, stereotypes, misconceptions and societal divisions.
And it’s addictive in all the best ways. I consumed this nearly 400-page novel in a little over two sittings, relishing its energy and guessing — and then guessing again — about what it means to be “good people.”
