'The Reluctant Fundamentalist' Mohsin Hamid

Another book from the 1001 list, I'd seen this book in the bookstores on the bestseller shelves and had admittedly been put off slightly by the title, thinking it would be full of political propaganda but I decided to buy it as the third book in a three for two offer and figured I had nothing to lose in reading it.  I couldn't have been further from the truth and I gobbled up this book on a lazy Sunday afternoon.  Set in modern-day America and Pakistan, a Pakistani stranger approaches an American tourist at a cafe table in Lahore and proceeds over the course of an afternoon and evening to tell him his life story.  Changez was a bright but impoverished student from Lahore who gains a scholarsip to Princeton, where he becomes one of the best in his graduating class, eventually gaining a place at an elite firm in New York.  Through his relationship with one of his former classmates, Changez gains entry into Manhattan high society and begins to enjoy the trappings of an upper class lifestyle that his family in Lahore had recently fallen from.  However, his charmed life changes dramatically following 9/11 and his reactions to this, coupled with the breakdown of his 'girlfriend' fuelled by events from the past that still haunt her, lead to the breakdown of his new position in life.  Predictably Changez faces racism in New York, where ignorants mistake him for a terrorist and he finds himself yearning for and eventually returning to Pakistan.  The novel is an easy read yet at the same time very thought provoking and it is refreshing to see an author clearly present Pakistan's resistance to westernized culture and gives the reader greater understanding of this, however I do think Hamid could have explored the theme further and pushed boundaries slightly more.  Though not a political novel in the true sense, I believe the story would appeal to readers who are politically minded and who want to be able to see another point of view rather than what we are force-fed by western media.