in those days, I fed my hopes of freedom in whichever way I could, without realizing that I was only hooking myself to different lures. (p88) - Laila Lalami

White Americans take that for granted in that they just have to turn on the TV or open the newspaper to see that. That isn’t something that everyone has, so these kinds of stories can be very affirming. As far as representation, it’s an interesting word. It conjures up some kind of necessity. For me, I write what I know. I’m Moroccan so I write Moroccan characters. I write in the specific, not with the burden of representing an entire Moroccan immigrant experience, but just those of my often very-flawed characters. I write in their specificity, with their unresolved conflicts and flaws, and that is how I expect to have any hope of reaching readers and showing some kind of truth that resonates with them. (2019)

There’s a disconnect between how people imagine their families and how families are in real life.

books hold so many memories of the times and places in which I’ve read them.