More Than Just a Pretty Face by Syed M. Masood
Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Special thanks to Manda Group for sending a copy for review.
Summary:
Danyal Jilani doesn’t lack confidence. He may not be the smartest guy in the room, but he’s funny, gorgeous, and going to make a great chef one day. His father doesn’t approve of his career choice, but that hardly matters. What does matter is the opinion of Danyal’s longtime crush, the perfect-in-all-ways Kaval, and her family, who consider him a less than ideal arranged marriage prospect.
When Danyal gets selected for Renaissance Man–a school-wide academic championship–it’s the perfect opportunity to show everyone he’s smarter than they think. He recruits the brilliant, totally-uninterested-in-him Bisma to help with the competition, but the more time Danyal spends with her…the more he learns from her…the more he cooks for her…the more he realizes that happiness may be staring him right in his pretty face (Goodreads).
Thoughts:
I picked up More Than Just a Pretty Face on a whim. The colourful cover art and my hope to finally read a realistic Muslim YA romance compelled me to start reading. This book follows the story of Danyal, a future chef and Pakistani Muslim living in America. Danyal has a huge crush on Kaval and will try anything he can to pursue and marry her. But then he meets Bisma, a nerdy girl, living a life defined by one mistake.
This story follows the classic trope and overused storyline that keeps the YA world spinning. The protagonist is madly in love with someone and they will do anything to win them over. They get put in a situation with another person, they catch feelings, and you know the rest. Personally, I don’t mind this trope but only if it is written right. The way it was written in More Than Just a Pretty Face was far from perfect, but it still encapsulated the bubbly, sweet, and young romance I love to read. While at times I felt that Bisma and Danyal’s relationship was moving extremely fast, and the overall story itself was very predictable, it was still an enjoyable read. Danyal played the cocky but hopeless romantic while Kaval played the mean girl who had his heart. The author did an amazing job creating Kaval as a character readers slowly but surely learn to dislike. The way she tried to change Danyal to benefit her own life, her attitude towards him when he started questioning her, and how her selfishness strongly contrasted Danyal’s selflessness. It became very prominent halfway through the novel that Danyal would not “choose” her.
As a Pakistani Muslim living in North America, I felt a strong connection to both Danyal and Bisma. At times, the arguments and stereotypes between Danyal’s parents made me realize: hey, brown parents really are the biggest cliche out there. In one scene, Danyal’s mother hit him with her slipper after he kissed Bisma in front of the whole school, only to later apologize and insist it was because she had to keep up her “reputation” as a strict and good Muslim mother. This threw me off a bit. Sadly, abuse is not rare in brown communities, especially regarding relationships between parents and children. The author made light of the abuse, which I found slightly ignorant and controversial. It made me uncomfortable, to say the least. Other than that, the way brown Muslim parents were portrayed in the novel was rather spot on.
Moving on to the reason I picked up the book in the first place: Muslim romance. I was very disappointed by how it was portrayed in this novel. Rules about Islamic guidelines and restrictions were introduced very early in the book, alongside Danyal’s feelings about these rules, but these restrictions were broken constantly. In one chapter, Danyal was shown feeling guilty about simply holding Bisma’s hand because that it is not allowed in Islam, but then a couple chapters later, he was kissing her in front of the whole school and his religious parents. Adding to that, the only strict Muslim and religious friend of Danyal’s, Sohrab, was portrayed as boring and annoying at times. When he was introduced as a very religious friend, I was thouroughly excited for a more one dimensional Muslim character. Once again, I was let down. He was very flat and seen as changed by religion; it was shown as his only personality trait. The other characters constantly talked down to him, described him as bland and uptight, and made him look almost like someone less than them. I was expecting more accurate and positive Muslim representations seeing that the author himself is an #OwnVoices author. I can not even count the number of times I have read YA books about Muslim romance and lives only to be disappointed by the way they were written.
Bisma and Danyals romance was one of the highlights of this novel. The slow burn made this book worth it in the end. While at times I felt Danyal was too shallow, Bisma and him together really mellowed him out. I liked reading about their cute lunch dates, how she helped him study and write his winning essay, and the way food tied in so well into their relationship. Danyal and Bisma are both Pakistani, and as we all know, Pakistani’s take their food very seriously. It also plays a huge part in Danyals life as he is an aspiring chef. One of the best scenes in the book is when he cooks her dinner. That moment in the book is when both the readers and Danyal know that he is thoroughly in love with Bisma.
The overall moral of this story is how we should not let our past mistakes and what people think about us define our future. I found myself feeling for Bisma, how her parents made her already hard life even worse by never letting her forget all the wrong she had done and all the shame she brought on her family and herself. The author did an amazing job encapsulating how one feels in this type of situation.
I give More Than Just a Pretty Face three out of five stars because this story had so much potential with its light-hearted vibe, but it had a mildly disappointing execution. The way religion and culture were portrayed was off in more ways than one, and that is one of the main reasons I give this novel less than a five star rating.
Reviewed by Aliza H.