Sima Qadeer's ​Brown Girls, Grown Up

Reviewed by Salma Hussain

Stay tuned for an interview with Sima Qadeer in Issue 36!

(Northwestern University Press, 2026)

“Fuck, give us more than one way of being brown.”

So laments a female character in Sima Qadeer’s debut collection of short stories, Brown Girls, Grown Up. With nine short stories that have titles ranging from “Paki Pussy,” to “Love Me a Coconut,” to “Tell the Truth and Shame the Devil,” Qadeer herself delivers on her character’s complaint, and presents readers with many different versions of being brown Muslim women in mid-life.

We are given portraits of Brown Muslim women getting Brazilians; dealing with unplanned pregnancies; miscarrying; dating white non-Muslim men; marrying Muslim men; processing their self-loathing and shame; cheating or being cheated upon; giving waspy, wealthy white women the (figurative) middle finger; bonding with other mothers over how shitty their husbands are and/or how shitty full-time parenting feels; smoking joints; getting drunk; using vibrators; and literally so much more.

So, yes … all kinds of brown. All kinds of women.

Nonetheless, the common thread running through these stories is that the protagonists are saddled with child-caring, social conformity and unfulfilling sex. There is also the pervasive sense of shame, guilt and unbelonging that runs through each of the stories.
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These women are caught at a crux in their lives: they are unhappy and dissatisfied with where they find themselves – 

​We have it all. We’ve done it. We were the good girls. Education. Done. Multiple degrees. Done. Marriage. Yup. Kids, career, owning real estate. Okay. Check. We nailed everything we were told to. But here we are, with a big ‘what the fuck have we been working for?’ Obsessing about? A patch of lawn in some generic neighbourhood …. full of generic families with generic careers. What’s next? Where do we go from here? Why does this all feel so …. [u]nsatisfying.

​These stories present cis midlife womanhood in raw, bleak, unflinching terms. The protagonists often find themselves in relationships with men who are a disappointment –

​Fuck, thought Amira. It was like all dicks shared the same, singular brain. Women were so screwed. It didn’t matter where they came from – skin color, religion, ethnicity, class – men were, universally, men.

Counterbalancing this resignation are moments of brown Muslim women’s resistance, self-discovery, and/or connection.

In one of my favorite stories, “Shaky, Fakey, Okay Lady,” the protagonist’s backstory is fleetingly mentioned: she grew up in domestic violence (“her father’s fist landed on the velvety smoothness of her mother’s cheek”), and she’s going through a divorce. Not wanting to give away the ending, in this particular story, we are given a clear and potent message that the protagonist is going to process her past, and that the hunger that has carried her so far already will guide her toward a new self-loving way forward.
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Resistance and hope are also showcased in “Love Me a Coconut,” wherein the protagonist’s friend, Nabeela (someone who “[has] always known where [she] belongs … has healthy Pakistani roots, … speaks fluent Urdu, … identif[ies] as Muslim …. [has] never had to question who [she is] or how [she] fit[s] into this cultural fucking fondue we grew up in”) counsels the self-loathing protagonist, Hanna –

​Screw them, Hanna. You’ll never make them happy, you’ll never be able to show them that you’re good enough as you are, that you don’t need to pray five times a day to be considered a ‘true Muslim.’ You don’t need their narrow-minded, doctrinal, judgmental version of religion or culture. You define what being Muslim, being Pakistani, being brown, being female, is for you. No one else has lived your life, and no one else gets to decide for you what you should believe in, or not. That is one hundred percent on you – exercise that muscle.

​And later again – 

​Listen, Hanna. I love you. I’m saying this with love. But since I’ve known you, you’ve been driven by a need to live up to others’ expectations, be something other than who you are. You’re brown, you grew up in an immigrant family, and you love your religion. Done. You don’t need to prove yourself to anyone, and anyone who thinks you’re not ‘brown’ enough or ‘Muslim’ enough – well screw them. That’s not for anyone else to decide but you. And that is the best role modeling you can give your kids.

At the end of “Love Me a Coconut,” Hanna’s daughter falls asleep snuggled next to Hanna, murmuring, “Pakistani is Mama. And Mama is love.” Hanna then ruminates, “we should all be so lucky to own the same truth.”
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In the end, it is this underlying, pulsating message of self-love in Sima Qadeer’s debut collection of short stories, Brown Girls, Grown Up that is the most taboo and radical of all. 

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Salma Hussain writes poetry and prose, and her writing has appeared in various literary magazines. Her debut chapbook of poetry, What If Maybe & Other Poems, was published by Baseline Press last summer. Her upcoming young adult novel, It's Not Over Yet, will be published by Penguin Random House Canada later this year. She lives in Toronto.