Ayad Akhtar is een gevierd toneelschrijver en romanschrijver wiens werken de complexiteit van identiteit, geloof en culturele botsingen onderzoeken. Zijn schrijven wordt gekenmerkt door een scherp inzicht in de menselijke psyche en een meesterlijke beheersing van taal, wat de lezer meesleept in diepgaande filosofische verkenningen. Door zijn verhalen daagt Akhtar vaak maatschappelijke normen uit, wat aanzet tot een herbeoordeling van onze eigen overtuigingen en vooroordelen. Zijn literaire stem is zowel provocerend als diep menselijk.
Part family drama, part satire, part picaresque, at its heart it is the story of a father and son, and the country they call home. Ranging from the heartland towns of America to palatial suites in Davos to guerrilla lookouts in the mountains of Afghanistan, Akhtar forges a narrative voice that is original as it is exuberantly entertaining
The story of Amir Kapoor (Aasif Mandvi), a successful Pakistani-American lawyer who is rapidly moving up the corporate ladder while distancing himself from his cultural roots. When Amir and his wife Emily (Heidi Armbruster), a white artist influenced by Islamic imagery, host a dinner party, what starts out as a friendly conversation escalates into something far more damaging.
From Pulitzer Prize winner Ayad Akhtar, a stirring and explosive debut novel about an American Muslim family in Wisconsin struggling with faith and belonging in the pre-9/11 world. Hayat Shah is a young American in love for the first time. His normal life of school, baseball, and video games had previously been distinguished only by his Pakistani heritage and by the frequent chill between his parents, who fight over things he is too young to understand. Then Mina arrives, and everything changes. American Dervish is a brilliantly written, nuanced, and emotionally forceful look inside the interplay of religion and modern life.