**Thanks to Netgalley and Random House Children's/Make Me a World Books for the eARC in exchange for an honest review. This in no way changed my rating**

Home is Not a Country is a novel in verse by Safia Elhillo. This is the first of her works I've read. The book follows Nima, who longs for a different life than her own. She imagines herself as Yasmeen, the name her mother originally considered for her before immigrating to America. Yasmeen is taller. She is more popular and self-assured. She's graceful and a good dancer. She is fluent in Arabic and has both parents. In short, she's the exact opposite of Nima. Due to this, Nima finds herself in a situation where she might have inadvertently ended up wishing her life away, thinking this was showing love to her family and friends. Thinking they wanted a "better" version of her than the one that exists.

The poetry was beautiful at times and strange at others for me. I feel like it's mostly me being nitpicky about "form" because of my background in English Literature, but I found the poems often had very strange breaks in them for no real reason. If read with a pause where the break is, it didn't add to the emotion of the poem for me or sound like someplace where a natural pause would be given were the poem to be read aloud. I would actually be really interested in hearing Elhillo read some of these aloud to see if that gives insight into the breaks. For me, it just seemed like it broke up the text on the page but had no stylistic purpose to it.

The themes of identity in relation to family, to your experiences (real or imagined), to your hometown and all the other little things that go into making you YOU and not someone else or some imagined version of you was well explored. Nima felt like she grew throughout the book, which is always a big thing for me. If the character feels stagnant, I'm not a fan. So I'm glad to see, even in such a short book, a significant growth that made the book that much better for me.

Nima's relationship with her mother was also well explored and one of my favorite parts of the book. Seeing the gap bridged between them was wonderful and seeing how certain events influenced her mother was also interesting.

Overall, this was a great story. The magical realism elements added to the plot in a meaningful way to help get the point across and the characters were well done. I think I would've enjoyed it more as an audiobook. Worth the read.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5 stars

I loved this. The close diary-like voice as Nima introduces us to her life is followed by a heart-pounding brush with death and trauma, leading to a magical realism center where Nima gets to help choose her fate.

The happy ending made me cry, and it was a complex feeling - with a wistfulness and wishing for all kids to be able to find empowerment and happy endings. Nima keeps pushing forward to find her truth and get to a place where she feels authentic in herself, not in how others perceive her.

For fans of The Poet X or Chlorine Sky, this is a novel-in-verse with gentle rhythms and pauses to lead the reader deeper into Nima's emotional life.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Children's Books for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

And, last night, I finally finished this beautiful novel told in prose about Nima. It discusses immigration, xenophobia, Islamophobia, identity, family dynamics, and uses magical realism to take you in a wild journey of self-reflection and discovery. HOME IS NOT A COUNTRY by Safia Elhillo reminds me of Elizabeth Acevedo or Jason Reynolds, but with less YA flair and a more in-depth, mature exploration of the themes.

Unlike many others of the genre, this is not a quick or easy read - but, if you read it, you really ought to sit with it and really take your time with these beautiful words.

Thank you to @netgalley, @randomhouse, and @safiamafia for the eARC to read and review.

I could not put it down. Captivated from the very beginning by a story so far from my own...and yet. At first Elhillo wrapped me in the warmth of her words, then suddenly with a mere suggestion I was terrified and just as suddenly in tears. Her ease and ingenuity with language sucked me in and I was truly transported. I consider this a necessary read for everyone, especially the "nostalgia monsters" out there (myself one of them). This stands out to me alongside titles such as Rankine's CITIZEN and Powers's THE OVERSTORY that radically changed my perception of the world moving forward. I cannot wait to continue reading Safia Elhillo's work.

-`ˏ 4 stars ˎ´˗

Storyline: -`ˏ 8/10 ˎ´˗
“Go back to your country!” How can you when your birth certificate identifies this IS your country? Nima was brought up in a suburb town with her mother who originally came from a Muslim country. She feels like an outsider who is fighting to find a place she should belong. She wonders what if things were different? What if she was different? If she wishes to be someone else, would it prevent her from facing tragedy and discrimination?

Characters: -`ˏ 6/10 ˎ´˗
Nima is the queen of running away during a midsentence. She doesn't feel understood, and yet she doesn't give people an opportunity to try and vice versa. There were times when somebody asks her what was going on and she chose to remain silent. Her outbursts were frustrating, she wondered if she should apologize for a long time until she reached a point where it is unfortunately too late. My heart aches more for her mother and friend Haitham. I saw my mother in this story as she lost my father under similar circumstances. I have witnessed my mother's struggles on her own to provide in a place where people despise you based on your appearance. Dealing with all that just for your child may have better life opportunities. Then there’s Haitham, he may be a bit of a bad influence, but he's a good friend to cherish. He tries to open Nima up to making friends and go places but she refuses. If you feel isolated and alone, you must at least try to take one step forward. This is definitely a scary process, sometimes you will fail, but if you do not try how can you expect anything to change.

Atmosphere: -`ˏ 8/10 ˎ´˗
The magical element was a unique and wonderful prospect to the story that became a saving grace. It was a great way to get Nima out of the prior state of mind. I love the flicking-in and out symbolism.
Trigger warnings: racism, islamophobia, self-degradation, abuse (physical, emotional, and verbal), police brutality, death of a loved one (mention), abduction (attempted).

Language: -`ˏ 10/10 ˎ´˗
The poetry collections flowed nicely together, which makes the writing exquisite.

Enjoyment: -`ˏ 8/10 ˎ´˗
Once the magical element became more prone I started enjoying it a lot more. Nima's interaction with “herself” really struck a chord. The ending wrapped up in a way that I wasn't expecting but really appreciated. I’m looking forward to hearing it again as an audiobook.

I’ve been struggling a lot with how to write this review. I’m a white guy, I’ve lived a privileged life. Sure, there have been instances of struggle in my life. I’ve struggled to fit in, to figure out who I am. Hell, I’m still trying to figure that last part out. I’ve struggle to find my home, where I truly feel like I belong.

That is the basis for Home Is Not a Country by Safia Elhillo. This junior fiction novel in verse centers on Nima’s struggle to fit in. She feels out of place in America as she’s Middle Eastern and, as we know, being Middle Eastern in America in a post-9/11 world is not a happy existence. She also does not feel like she’s truly Middle Eastern. All she has are memories shared from her mom and old tapes from her homeland. Her dad died back home before she was born. She doesn’t feel like she’s even a whole person.

Sometimes she dreams of being Yasmeen, the girl her dad wanted. She’s bright and vibrant. She speaks fluent Arabic and English. She’s the yellow flower of her mom’s life. Nima starts to see a flickering image of Yasmeen whenever she feels empty. She sees the girl she wants to be. Here’s where it goes from a general angsty junior fiction book to a supernatural-infused introspection on who Nima could be. I really don’t want to spoil it for you, but it really takes a left turn in a great way.

I’ll be honest, it was a struggle to get started on this book. I didn’t understand why it was in verse (although I love novels in verse) and it was really boring, to be honest. However, once it hits that twist, it is fantastic. I absolutely loved this book by the end of it. Nima’s story is something to really behold.

I honestly was prepared to rate this at 3/5, 5/10 until that middle change. Now, it’s a 5/5, 10/10. Definitely pick this up on March 2nd, 2021.

Thanks NetGalley for the eARC!

This novel in verse is perfect for fans of Elizabeth Acevedo...or anyone that wants to be taken on a journey through words and color. Nima always feels like she doesn't belong, the words in her mouth aren't hers, her body isn't hers, her name shouldn't be hers, she is invisible. The feeling of loneliness finally takes hold when she thinks she has lost her best friend, Haitham, from her life forever. What happens next is a journey through looking at a life she could've had, with the name that should've been hers. Will Nima like what she sees? Will her sense of family, and belonging finally feel complete?
Reading this feels like a lesson in emotions. It allows oneself to emotionally hold onto the characters, and feel, really and truly feel, their heartache and pain. The descriptive narrative uses colors to convey a sense of feeling towards the reader, and if this doesn't tell you all you need to know about this masterpiece, I don't know what will.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Home is Not a Country by Safia Elhillo is the best YA book I have read in years. Mind you, YA is not particularly my taste, but this novel written in prose really transcends genre to become something universally moving and understood.

Home is Not a Country follows Nima, a girl filled with questions about herself, her heritage, and her identity within the context of her family as well as society. She longs to be a different version of herself, one she personifies in the name Yasmeen, which was originally planned to be her name before the loss of her father caused her mother to give her the name Nima, instead. This novel is about identity and family, past and future, home and homeland. While this novel is short, I think it does exactly what it was meant to, the prose so vivid and precise, the atmosphere and culture almost tangible. I was moved and amazed by this book, and cannot believe it is a debut novel.

I don’t really know what else to say. I know I have been pretty generous with my 5 star ratings so far this year, but this book really deserves it. Please give this novel a chance- it won’t take you much time to read, but I’m sure you will be thinking about it long after you are finished. Thank you Netgalley, Safia Elhillo, and Make Me A World for an early copy of this novel.

This novel-in-verse is told from the perspective of Sudanese American teenager Nima, who feels like an outsider in her suburban town. As her life is flipped upside down, she grows obsessed with the name her parents almost gave her, Yasmeen, and with the life she might have led with a different name.

Everything about this book worked wonderfully for me: the plot, the verse, the characters, and the whole concept of exploring the person you could have been had life turned out differently. Safia Elhillo is absolutely worthy of the comparisons to Elizabeth Acevedo and Jason Reynolds--two authors I absolutely adore. She knocked this book out of the park.

There's something that cane be so powerful about novels written in verse. I think that often, it can elevate the reading experience and can make it so much easier to relate to the characters. Home is Not a Country is a beautiful exploration or self, family, and what home really means.

As the ground is pulled out from under her, Nima must grapple with the phantom of a life not chosen, the name her parents didn't give her at birth: Yasmeen. But that other name, that other girl, might just be more real than Nima knows. And more hungry. And the life Nima has, the one she keeps wishing were someone else's...she might have to fight for it with a fierceness she never knew she had."

A Home Is Not a Country is a wonderful novel written in verse. It is about destiny, belonging, and family love is not tied to where you are from, but where you are at and making life the best it can be. It is also about living in the NOW and not dwelling in the past.

Nima is a young Arabic-American girl is is consumed with old photos of her deceased father she never knew who died in the "old country" and the stories surrounding her name. Why was she given her name and not Yasmeen, which was her father's choice?!

Thinking that this other name would have made her young life so much better and not the awkward loner that she is. Well, you know what they say-be careful what you wish for!

The imagination can be strong and talking to the spirits can be even stronger. Because Nima has to figure out how to fight for her existence!

My first love as a writer is poetry. And, even though I haven't practiced my craft in a long time, these novels written in verse are amazing. I enjoyed this novel and felt that the story was easy to follow in its poetic form. I thought the characters were sincere and if you have an immigrant background, you understand the family struggles especially when you only have a hardworking single parent and the stories they share from "back home" are often not the best of memories.

With the name Yasmeen floating around, Nima feels that maybe should would be happier as this other child with this other name.

At the end of the day, this story allows you to understand that life is what you make it.

Thanks NetGalley for the advance read.

Home Is Not a Country by Safia Elhillo
Pub Date: 3/2/2021

This novel in prose was lovely and lyrical and heart breaking and uplifting in equal measures... I admit I had a little bit of an adjustment period at first getting used to the uneven line breaks, punctuation, and capitalization - but once I stopped looking for logic and fell into the feel of the words, I had a much easier time. This was a powerful read...

Absolutely phenomenal! My heart ached for Nima and my heart exploded with joy as she found herself, her family, the truth, her history and her future. How Safia wove her love for the old country and the nostalgia of different times was beautiful. But watching Nima find all that she had to live for and find a home for Yasmeen was just so powerful. Thank you for the opportunity to read this book! I’ve been telling all my book-loving friends about it and will be sharing it on my Instagram and Goodreads! Great great book!

Home is Not a Country is a novel in verse about Nima, the sole child of an immigrant, Muslim woman who longs for more. Alone and with one friend in life, Nima wonders what might have been if she was named Yasmeen, if her father had never died, if her parents had never left their home. This wondering consumes her and soon the dream of Yasmeen starts to become realer than she imagined.

This book is beautifully told in flowing verse which never feels sparse. Nima's personality and the struggles she and her mother faces as immigrants, Muslims, and a single mother and daughter come through clearly in the writing. One thing I love about books written in verse is that they often flow so nicely, making the reading experience a bit like a song. In this book, music is very important, so that comparison is very apt and welcome within this story.

The story itself speaks of looking at what you have in your life, instead of what you're missing or what life could be. It's ultimately a story of happiness and making your own, despite what life hands you, or how hard society wants to keep you down. Above all, it's an exploration of the mother-daughter bond. As someone who is very close to my mother but had a rocky relationship in my teen years, it was so nice to see this relationship represented.

This is also an ownvoices novel by a Muslim, Sudanese-American woman, and it's a story I knew I wanted to read for that very reason. The novel presents untold stories of being an immigrant, of being a religious minority, around 2001. Elhillo gracefully deals with racism, with feeling displaced and homesick for a country you've never known, and I loved being able to take this viewpoint for a time.

My one criticism of the book is that a fight with a friend in the beginning of the novel is later written off, when I wished that it could have been dealt with properly. I think there was time for that in this novel, particularly if certain sections had been tightened up more. There was very little lagging, but some moments towards the middle where I thought "what are we doing here?" If that had been reduced and more time spent on resolving that important fight, I think it would have shown that Nima had learned something for her experience, shown some growth.

Overall, I can highly recommend Home is Not a Country, particularly for those readers who wish to read more diversely. Although the experiences may not be relatable to all, Elhillo transcends any barriers to understanding with loveable characters, gorgeous writing, and enduring themes.

I already know this is one of the best books I will read this year. The last time I cried this much in a book was in A Sky Beyond the Storm. It caught me off guard honestly - how raw and honest and breathing ly beautiful this is. To all my children of immigrants, this is a must read. This is written in verse as well but it is easy to read, easy to keep up with, and there’s so much to unpack. This is definitely one of those books I wish I had analyzed in English and Reading growing up in the American education system instead of consistent poetry written by old white men. The feeling of loneliness, of not belonging, of wanting to be different and wanting more was captured so perfectly by Safia. I can’t recommend this enough. Just wow.

ARC provided via NetGalley in exchange for honest review.

Nima struggles finding her place in her world: the Muslim country she and her mother immigrated from that she longs for and the post 9/11 world they try to call home. The first part of the book discusses racism, bullying, and trying to find acceptance as Nima is unhappy in America and wishes to discover a new version of herself. With a touch of magical realism, Nima is transported to her homeland and the time before her mother immigrated to the United States. This twist was so surprising to me and kept me captivated. I think my students would enjoy this flash to the past as well.

I absolutely will be purchasing a copy for my classroom and recommending this novel in verse to my students. The ideas are powerful, the writing is beautiful, and I devoured the book in one sitting.

When I received my ARC from Random House through Netgalley I was surprised to find I had missed the fact that ‘Home is Not a Country’ by Safia Elhillo was to be a novel told in verse. Therefore, I found myself just enough disconcerted to pause prior to reading. That was the only pause as Elhillo’s language was both fluid and compelling. Like a river into which I had fallen it pulled me along.

The interweaving of the real and the surreal is done seamlessly. The reader’s connection to the grit, the religious intolerance, and the emotional content of a life lived is found in equal measure in those dreamlike moments of magical realism. Time is as much a character as the people. The past is as tangible as the present. The imagination is as important as actions taken.

‘Home is Not a Country’ sweeps away the boundaries of place and time to situate the reader in the interior of the protagonist, Nima, as she navigates her desire for something she believes she does not have. The old country holds as much sway as the new. Until she can determine which will take precedence, which will be her grounding, she is adrift.

‘Home is Not a Country’ is a powerful book of tender reflection at odds with an unfeeling and indifferent world. A book exploring the desire for home, when choosing one means giving up another. A book of change, of a possible future.

Safia Elhillo, does not shy away from the trauma of the brutal oppression of the old country nor the scars left by the hatred of the new. She explores with distinct understanding what it means to be immigrant, to be Muslim in a Christian world, and to be all too clearly designated ‘other’. This is no diatribe against the outside world, but a grappling with the interior one. More emotional than critical, more thoughtful musing than heedless action, ‘Home is Not a Country’ allows the reader to become. To grow. To understand.

I never read poetry so while I may not be the best judge of how well the poetry itself is written structure wise, I can say that the beautiful world that is brought to life on the page and story was beautiful. This book covers alot of hard subjects including racism, bullying, identity and feeling like in outsider in your own country. I thought the story was beautiful and handled all of these issues really well.

I'm usually a big fan of free-verse poetry as a narrative and have enjoyed Elizabeth Acevedo and Jason Reynolds' books, but something about the style of this book just didn't work for me. The story line is important, and I wanted to love it, but the layout of the verses made it difficult for me to focus. I know a lot of people have written rave reviews, and I'm sure they're deserved, but this wasn't the book for me.

Thanks, NetGalley, for the ARC.

I am about the furthest thing from an expert on poetry. I have no idea what would be considered “good” and “bad” structure, rhythm, verse—any of it. So this is probably not going to be the best review to read if you’re looking for that kind of analysis.

Instead I can offer what a layman may think about this type of writing. I can recognize that something sounds nice but maybe not be able to articulate why. Also since this is a novel in verse as opposed to a collection of poetry, there’s a flowing narrative throughout that I think most people would be able to follow along with. So I’m going to be reviewing that story and how it’s related to the reader, not so much the prose itself. Hopefully some people still find that helpful.

The first part of the novel follows Nima, a teenage girl living in the United States with her mother, an immigrant from an unnamed Arabic-speaking country. (The author describes the country’s flag as red, green, white & black, and there are likely other markers which would clarify the specific country, but I wasn’t able to pick up on any of them. Safia Elhillo’s parents emigrated from Sudan, but it seems to be an intentional choice not to name their nation of origin, so I didn’t make that assumption with regards to Nima.)

Nima has a lot of the same insecurities of other teenagers, like loneliness and feeling like an outsider, but she’s also struggling in ways many of her peers can’t relate to. Both her and her childhood friend, Haitham, are living in a post-9/11 America. Nima is called a terrorist, mocked for her religion, bullied, shunned and harassed by her classmates and strangers alike. She finds herself daydreaming of an alter-ego version of herself, who Nima thinks of as Yasmeen, and disconnects from her life in the US by imagining what could have been if her mother hadn’t left her homeland.

Then around halfway through the story it changes into something else entirely. Nima enters a kind of dream-like state where she gets to watch her parents when they were young, before she was born, alongside her mirror self Yasmeen. This was a turn I wasn’t expecting this book to take, but I ended up really liking it. The differing perspective for the main character in imagining ‘what could have been’ was a great way to put her own actual life in perspective. Obviously I can’t get too much into the details without giving things away, but it was a welcome subversion of my expectations for this book.

I might have preferred a slightly different ending, but based on the rest of the story, where Nima and her family and friends ended up made thematic sense. I wasn’t sure how I would take to a verse novel, but this one has inspired me to pick up more soon. Maybe Clap When You Land next? Not sure, but I’m also excited to read more from this author in the future!