The Wish Maker

by Ali Sethi

A major new international voice debuts with a sweeping story of love, friendship, and family ties that brings to life the turbulent world of modern Pakistan.

The unforgettable story of a fatherless boy growing up in a household of outspoken women, The Wish Maker is also a tale of sacrifice, betrayal, and indestructible friendship. Zaki Shirazi and his female cousin Samar Api were raised to consider themselves "part of the same litter." Together they watched American television and memorized dialogue from Bollywood movies, attended dangerous protests, and formed secret friendships. In a household run by Zaki's crusading political journalist mother and iron-willed grandmother, it was impossible to imagine a future that could hold anything different for either of them.

But adolescence approaches and the cousins' fates diverge. Samar's unconventional behavior-in which Zaki has played the role of devoted helper-brings severe consequences for her, while Zaki is sent out to discover the world for himself. It is only after years of separation from Samar that he is forced to confront the true nature of happiness, selfhood, and commitment to those he loves most.

Chronicling world-changing events that have never been so intimately observed in fiction and brimming with unmistakable warmth and humor, The Wish Maker is the powerful account of a family and an era, a story that shows how, even in the most rapidly shifting circumstances, there are bonds that survive the tugs of convention, time, and history.

Genres: Fiction, Pakistan, Literary Fiction, Contemporary, Novels, Coming Of Age, Family

432 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2009

About the author

Ali Sethi grew up in Pakistan in a family of dissenting journalists and publishers. A recent Harvard graduate, he has contributed to The New York Times and The Nation among other publications. He currently lives in Lahore.

Reviews

[Sonja Rosa Lisa ♡ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Erzählt wird die Geschichte von Zaki Shirazi und seiner Cousine Samar Api. Sie wachsen zusammen in Pakistan auf, und man erfährt vieles über dieses Land und seine Kultur. Anfangs war es für mich etwas schwierig, in die Geschichte hineinzukommen, denn es fallen viele fremdartige Namen, die erst nachgeschlagen werden müssen. Aber andererseits ist es vielleicht gerade das, was dieses Buch irgendwie faszinierend macht.
Die Geschichte wird in zwei Zeiten erzählt. Der erwachsene Zaki kehrt aus den USA zurück nach Pakistan, um die Hochzeit seiner Cousine Samar Api zu feiern. Als er zurück in seiner Heimat ist, erinnert er sich an seine Kindheit, die sehr detailliert beschrieben wird.
Bis auf die etwas langwierige "Einlesephase" hat mir dieses Buch sehr gut gefallen. Besonders interessant ist es, so tiefen Einblick in ein fremdes Land, seine Kultur, Religion und Gebräuche zu bekommen!

[Umamah W. Zia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Despite Sethi's remarkable talent for weaving words together with poetry and poignancy, I can understand why The Wish Maker has received such low ratings on this site. Because here's the thing; The Wish Maker is a story about a Pakistani family told by a Pakistani author and seems to address a Pakistani reader. By this I mean that the novel is unapologetic in its addressing of Desi customs or words. Sethi doesn't attempt to explain the meanings of italicized Urdu words or describe what shalwar kameez dupatta look like. This isn't the attempt of a Desi man introducing Desi culture to an international audience.
Instead, it's a personal journey and a vivid recounting of the way that relationships are woven together in Pakistan, of the struggles that are perhaps a part of every Pakistani's life in one way or another. South Asians can probably relate well to the honesty with which Sethi presents his characters, seeing in themselves the facades and the genuineness that complex people are comprised of.
There is no real story, no exact plot progression but as you read through the rich details and the beautiful imagery his language evokes, you feel that this was the purpose. The true strength of The Wish Maker lies in the many stories that have brought the characters to where they are now, rather than an overarching plot. Sethi's focus on the struggles and strength of the women of the family shines best with his ability to understand the emotional and mental development of his characters.
If you're looking for a story with a strong plot and progress through action, this is not the book for you. If you are not from South Asia and are hoping this will be a good introduction into life in Pakistan, you may want to reconsider. But if you are someone who enjoys poetic prose and stories that focus on character development and the complex relationships that can exist in multi-generational tales and large South Asian families, you may want to pick this up.

[Kiersten · Rating 1 out of 5]

I really disliked this book. It was painful to get through. By the end, I was just skimming, trying to finish, hoping something redeeming would happen. I should have just quit reading like I wanted to initially. Nothing happens in this book. There is no plot. At all. The narration skips all over the place--from the main character to his mother, to his grandmother...ahh! And Sethi would rarely just come out and say anything--he kept using this superfluous, flowery language to hint at things happening. In my opinion, this method of narration is effective if it's used once or twice in a book; when it happens every other page, it's just annoying. The synopsis on the dust jacket (it's the description that Goodreads uses) seems to have very little to do with the book itself.

Here are my problems with the description of the book:

Supposedly this is a tale of "sacrifice, betrayal, and indestructible friendship."

First of all, "sacrifice": I guess you could say that Zaki's mother had to make some sacrifices; however, I mostly got the feeling that she was an innatentive, self-absorbed mother who was more concerned about politics than she was about her son. Zaki's probably the one who had to give up the most, his mother for his country, but since he had no say in this, I'm not really sure it counts as a sacrifice.

Now "betrayal": The only betrayal I can think of is when Samar's school friend, Tara, turns on her. But guess what. The exact same thing happens every single day between bratty little girls in junior high, so I don't really think that counts.

And then "indestructible friendship"? I suppose this is talking about the friendship between cousins Zaki and Samar. However, it kind of seems like it was destructible--she goes back to live with her mom, he goes to America, and they never talk again. And I didn't really get that they were such good friends to begin with anyway. There isn't any character development between the two in the book. When they do hang out, it just seems like Samar kind of orders Zaki around and he just dumbly agrees to everything she says, no matter how ridiculous it is. I guess he was upset when she had to go back and live with her crazy parents, as evidenced by him acting out in school, but there just didn't seem to be a very strong correlation there. And he seemed fine once he went to the new school, so that almost seemed to negate the idea that his behavior was caused by the loss of his cousin.

And the final paragraph:

But adolescence approaches and the cousins’ fates diverge. Samar’s unconventional behavior—in which Zaki has played the role of devoted helper—brings severe consequences for her, while Zaki is sent out to discover the world for himself. It is only after years of separation from Samar that he is forced to confront the true nature of happiness, selfhood, and commitment to those he loves most.

Samar's "unconventional behavior" seemed more like teenage rebellion than anything very earth shattering. Maybe the author just hasn't spent much time around adolescent girls. The "severe consequences" may have happened, but they weren't described. Samar simply goes back to live with her parents and then several years later is mentioned again. Big deal. If something happened in the interim, let us know! In a society where a woman who admits to being raped may be stoned to death as an adulteress unless she can produce four males to testify in her behalf, Samar seemed to have gotten off pretty darn easily, in my opinion. And I'm not sure when Zaki ever confronted "the true nature of happiness, selfhood and commitment to those he loves most." When exactly did that happen? He writes some emails to his mom and he admits to the reader, in a passage that could easily be overlooked or misunderstood, that he is a homosexual. I guess that was it.

To sum it up, I'm just in a really bad mood about this book. I was excited to read it after looking over the dust jacket description, but now that I've finished it, I feel like I've been lied to or something.

[Marie Burton · Rating 1 out of 5]

I had high hopes for this book. I know very little about Pakistani culture, and still know very little. Understanding that this is a novel, and not meant to teach me about anything, I still just could not get interested in the many characters this is written about. It is centered on a young boy, Zaki, and what he goes through living with a lot of women, including a female cousin Samar Api from whom most of the teen-aged type drama comes from. His day to day experiences are written out, and the prose was nothing to complain about, it was simply the dryness of the actual story that made it difficult to read. It reverts from Zaki's point of view to then focusing on his mother, at an earlier time, and at another interval it goes into a different character, at another time... I just could not get my head wrapped around it since it bounced me around like a ping-pong ball. I dislike books that go back and forth in time with multiple characters as I cannot get a mental grip on it. I assume the author was aiming for a family saga type of genre with the way the many characters were given special attention, from the grandmother to the cousin to a friend.



It actually started off promising, I did enjoy it for the first 100 pages or so. And this is a debut novel so I was making allowances for it. But it was about halfway through when I started feeling let down. I did appreciate the referrals to Benazir, although I had to use Wikipedia to figure out the reality of what was going on when they forced Benazir Bhutto out as Prime Minister for the first time. I disliked Zaki's sexual experiences, which were few, but it probably jaded and disgusted me from then and there. Yet, I read the book to about page 305 of my Advance Reading Copy and just flipped through the rest, I spent 4 days on this book and did not look forward to having to pick it up again. I wanted to get to some point where I would say "this was worth it" but I didn't foresee it happening.

I am fully aware that this is my opinion only, and I can see on Amazon two favorable reviews on it so there has got to be an audience for this coming-of-age-story-in-a-round-about-way-type of book (is there a plot here?). Perhaps for those in or close to Pakistan this would be a winner. Unfortunately, that just wasn't me for this one. I am curious to know what others felt about it though, am I just a complete fool who cannot recognize pure genius? We shall see.

[Anum Shaharyar · Rating 2 out of 5]

Nowhere is nepotism more obvious than in the publication of books by the Sethi siblings, because nowhere else would you be able to write drivel such as this and be able to get it published. I guess the only good thing about Ali Sethi’s novel is that it’s better than Mira Sethi's, which isn’t saying much given how god awful that collection of short stories was.

In all honesty, I really wanted this book to be good. I wanted it to be interesting, and intensely readable, and worth recommending, if only because my husband saw the author’s name on the cover and snorted. “He sings and writes?” he said in a dismissive tone, which offended me, the artist in this relationship. “People can be talented in multiple fields,” I said defensively, and set off to feverishly finish this novel in the hopes that it would get better at the halfway point, or when I was a quarter of the way through, or maybe near the ending.

Let’s just say that the point never came, and while I’m still convinced that people can be talented across multiple fields, maybe Sethi is not the author I should have tried to base my argument on. It’s not that it’s a bad book. Horribly awful tales, I’ve always believed, have their own ways of entertaining. When I was reading H. M. Naqvi’s Home Boy, I spent so much of my time ranting about it to my best friend, but at least I was engaged. A really bad book can be entertaining in its own way, simply by providing you with something to talk about. But it’d be impossible for me to talk about this book a few weeks from now, given how utterly forgettable it was.

Told from the point of view of a young boy coming back to Pakistan to attend a cousin’s wedding, the story seems to want to be about big, important things. Happiness, selfhood, a character forced to confront their own lives, these are the concepts the blurb mentions, but the execution fails to rise to the challenge pretty much from the start to the finish. Nothing much of consequence happens at any point in the story, and even when it does, it never feels alarming enough to make us invested in the characters and their well being. This, I believe, might be the flaw that ruined my interest, because in a tale focused solely on its people and their trials, not caring about a single one of them is tantamount to yawning through the entire thing.

“And Zaki doesn’t even have a father,” Samar Api said.
“Isn’t it amazing,” said Tara Tanvir after she had heard the stories, “how we all come from broken homes?”

This is quite sad because, honestly, there was a lot of potential. I could have cared about a lot of these characters: the domineering grandmother, the politically-inclined mother, and the household maid formed a female-oriented household rounded off by the cousin, Samar Api, brought to live with them from the village. Zaki, our protagonist, grows up under the wings of all these women, and on the surface this sounds like a wonderful tale. How might a boy growing up with so many women grow up differently? I should have loved this story, but literally not a single one of their tales managed to make me care about the outcomes of their problems.

“What have we done?” cried the mother-in-law. “To earn this shame? What have we done?”
She heard it for some minutes and then she shouted, “I will do what I want! I will decide! Not you! Not your son! I will decide!”

This idea of complex adults, parent figures with their own lives and desires, was covered so well by Kamila Shamsie in Broken Verses. I’d be the first one to admit that back when I began reading Pakistani books, I didn’t want to be a purely Kamila Shamsie fan. I wanted to give other Pakistani authors a chance, simply because Shamsie is the most famous name within this particular circle of writers, and I was convinced that there were other authors out there who just hadn’t been given a chance.

But the more books I read, the more I see how those other authors are unable to rise to Shamsie’s level. You can claim that she had an easier entry into the publishing world: Shamsie is rich, she’s privileged, she’s got connections. But she’s also, unlike our author here, really very good at writing her stories. And Sethi, with this book, is proof that you can have all the privileges in the world and still manage to produce mediocre texts.

My mother said he was a feudal.
“What’s feudal?”
“Feudalism,” she said, “is one of the oldest systems in the world. It’s when a small group of people own a lot of land and make other people work on that land but eat up all the revenues.”

Sethi wanted to do a lot of good things, I can at least give him that. The book attempts to talk about issues which clearly matter to him, and on a lot of those particular topics I’m on his side. But is it enough for an author to have good intentions? If it was his particular stance on certain things that I was interested in, I could have simply read an interview. In a narrative, I want to be sucked into the lives of the people whose lives I’m reading about. It could be fantasy, or horror, or even a simple slice of life tale. Do I care about what’s happening? As long as that holds true, I can keep reading. But with Zaki’s tale, I never really started caring, even when the text seemed interesting or held my attention for the shortest period of time.

“There are three A’s for Pakistan,” he said. “Army, Allah, America.”
“And avaam!” she cried indignantly.
“And avaam,” he conceded, humbled by her insistence on having it included, “and avaam.”

Even when Sethi leaned fully into the Pakistani experience, leading into conversations that sound as familiar to me as background dialogue at a family dinner, I still managed to remain uninvested. This was particularly problematic because it is the inherent desi-ness of Pakistani books that endears me to them. The more an author brings to life the nuances of having lived and grown up in Pakistan, the more I enjoy a book, for very obvious reasons. But even though Sethi ticked all the right boxes when it came to naming all the brands I grew up using and mentioning the places I knew the names of, the moments where I jumped with joy at the things I recognized still weren’t powerful enough to engage me with the entire narrative overall.

We went first to Jalal Sons: she went into the stark white aisles inside and selected the insect-repelling Flit dispensers, the small white phenyl balls that were placed above the drains of bathrooms and came in plastic packets, a stack of Capri soaps, three small jars of Dentonic dental powder and three tubes of Medicam toothpaste; she dropped the items into the shopping cart and went into Feminine Care, selected Bio Amla shampoo and Kala Kola hair tonic, a tin of Touch Me talcum powder, a small blue bottle of Nivea face cream for Daadi and a tub of the cheaper Tibet Snow fairness cream for herself.

I’ve been reading Pakistani literature for years now, buoyed by my own realization during my university years of my total dependence upon North American novels to satisfy my reading urges, and to be fair a lot of the desi novels I’ve read have scratched that elusive itch: a reflection of people like me in the stories I was reading. It was only after I started reading local authors that I realized it was possible that the things I knew could be counted as cultural currency, and Sethi managed to provide that as well. But even with the presence of such a regional connection, and even with the text that sometimes provided something worth highlighting, in the end I wasn’t truly satisfied. It’s not enough for a book to just be from Pakistan, and to talk about Pakistani things. The characters must be strong enough to stand on their own, and here, unfortunately, they didn’t.

“Well. It’s hard to say what’s true sometimes. One person might have one way of looking at things. And another person might have another way. You can hold your own beliefs as long as they allow other people to live their lives. You can’t tell me that your beliefs are better than mine. I wouldn’t like that. And neither would you, if you put yourself in my position.”

Basically, I guess what I’m trying to say is that there are some parts in the book that are worth reading. Few and far between, but they exist, if only because they provide something to talk about, such as the mention of queerness. In an Ali Sethi book, given his public declaration of a relationship with a man and given that this book is supposed to be semi-autobiographical, maybe I should have expected our protagonist’s confusion over his sexuality, but it was still a surprise to me because talking about sexuality in Pakistan is a dangerous thing, given the country’s complex relationship with anyone on the lgbtq+ spectrum.

To make matters more complicated, Sethi seems to be unable to decide exactly how much he wants to reveal, alluding and implying but never really discussing any of the complicated emotions that can occur while living as a person who isn’t straight in a country like Pakistan. The one scant scene in the narrative that might have shown our protagonist’s inner turmoil was barely touched upon in one vaguely phrased paragraph and then never mentioned again. It seems Ali Sethi took the precept of Show, Don’t Tell a little too seriously, keeping strictly to the motions of our hero’s actions and losing the chance to explore the richer inner workings of his fraught young mind.

On the other hand, the sort of rich person lifestyle that one can find in so many of our Pakistani books, replete with drinking, drugs, and partying, makes its customary appearance in quite a lot of frank detail. As someone who grew up in a very middle class family where drinking or drugs was never a possibility, to me it’s very strange to be reading about a lifestyle so very different from my own. I can’t tell if my own version of a desi life is the product of a very sheltered upbringing, or if the constant prevalence of alcohol and casual sexuality in local books is caused by most English-language Pakistani authors belonging to a particularly rich strata of desi society.

“Over here,” he said hopelessly, “everything goes on underground. Everyone does everything.” He meant the people in the society pages, from whose world he was excluded. He went on to list their vices in a burning whisper: “Partiessharties, coke-shoke, anything and everything, E bhenchod, speed and heroin.”
“Orgies,” said Moosa with a smile of depravity, a guilty smile that suggested complicity of intent if not in the act itself. “Swapping partners. There’s a club in Karachi where you swap your car keys first.” He laughed mordantly, as if at a hard but distant memory of the thing. “And gays. So many gays.”

Still, and I’ve said this before: just because an author doesn’t reveal a part of the country that you never experienced yourself is no reason to disparage a narrative. Pakistan is a country of wildly different cultures and experiences, and the point of reading desi literature is to be exposed to all of it, but that literature has to be, at the end of the day, worth reading, and the fact that I was ready for the story to finish before I had reached the hundredth page says something about my reading experience. It didn’t help that the author, who must not be from Karachi, made an absolutely ridiculous claim about the city where I was born and bred. As a rule, I don’t much care for the ‘Which city is better’ argument that so many Lahoris and Karachiites like to engage in, but reading someone disparaging the city of my birth when I was already bored with the narrative only served to make me more irritated.

He said, “Are there any monuments?”
She tried to think of monuments. There were none. It came to her that Karachi had no history.

What? WHAT?! Of course, there was no going back after this, but even before we reached this point of no return, my notes were littered with angry editorial notes. The random italicization. The word ‘beta’ being italicized but not ‘sawaiyya’, ‘matar pulao’ being italicized but not ‘eid mubarak’. The obsession with conjunctions. The inability to use a comma to separate items in a list. By the time I read the hundredth ‘and’ separating multiple somethings, I was about ready to tear my own hair out.

She found the painter, and he said she could use the phone in his bedroom and pointed her to it; she went in and didn’t switch on the light and sat down on the bed, which was hard, and dialed the code and then the number and waited.

In conclusion, I guess I’m going to go back to the question I started this entire review with: as a debut novel, how was this rambling, pointless story allowed to be published? At first I worried that I was judging this book too harshly because it shows such a different lifestyle from what I know, but I know myself enough to know that I don’t expect Pakistani novels to represent all of Pakistan. I don’t even expect them to represent the Pakistan I know. What I do expect any story, desi or otherwise, to have is at least the bare bones of something that will keep me engaged. That could be through a good story, or a smart analysis, or even just really good writing. Unfortunately, Sethi’s work fails on almost all fronts, being categorically boring, uninspired, and with no creativity in sight. Even by the halfway mark one can tell that this is a pointless, meandering sort of tale which doesn’t go anywhere or have any conflict worth getting invested in.

Ali Sethi should definitely stick to music: Pasoori was a huge global hit, wrangling a Coachella invitation for Sethi from its overwhelming success, I’ve blasted Tinak Dhin enough times on our car speakers to be able to sing it word for word, and Ranjish Hi Sahih is a personal favorite of mine, but this book was unremarkable enough to be shelved in the ‘never-again’ portion of my personal library. All I can say is I’m glad I borrowed it from the library and didn’t spend any of my hard-earned money on it.

As a last note, here’s a piece of news related to this book that absolutely made me crack up: The Wish Maker was long-listed for the 2011 DSC Prize for South Asian Literature, ultimately losing to the aforementioned H. M. Naqvi's, Home Boy, a book which I’ve already mentioned was so atrocious that it kept me entertained with my own ranting for days. Now if only The Wish Maker had had the decency to be as terrible as Home Boy, I would at least have been entertained. As it was, all I had to accompany me during my reading experience was pure, unadulterated ennui, which is the biggest crime of all. Absolutely unforgiveable. Not recommended.

***

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[Hafsa | حفصہ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Recommended To Fans of: contemporary adult fic, South Asian history and DESI people!!

Goodreads ratings are misleading, big time!

This book was a delight, it was everything I was expecting and more! If you're sick of reading about white people and their culture or just anything foreign and long for something "desi", look no further! This is a coming-of-age story and with Sethi's knack for writing exceptional characters and creating amazing descriptions for the backdrop of the novel - 80s and 90s Lahore, Pakistan (all old souls rejoice please), it was a complete nostalgic trip down the lane of lives my parents/grandparents love to talk about.

Here's the thing though, I might be bias. No, I am bias. Because, duh, Pakistani, Lahore is love! On a serious note, as a Pakistani it was easier to envisage places mentioned in the novel (MALL ROAD!), connect to major historical events (history student here) and laugh on the humour only Pakistanis or well only desi people can understand. References to Faiz's poems, Madam Noor Jehan's singing, Benazir Bhutto and PPP (Roti, Kapra, Makaan!) and the general political turbulence experienced by the country in that period were highly appreciated and relatable as well as a treat to read about.

Although, there was no larger progressive plot or in simple words, a climax, that readers search for in any book, the intricately woven characters, their lives and dilemmas were well presented. I also loved that there were a lot of Pakistans to admire in the book - the newly independent Pakistan, the conservative Pakistan (under zia's martial law), the war-torn Pakistan, the feminist Pakistan and lots more - this was the one thing that made me go through some bland over descriptive chapters. Sethi perfectly captured the complex relationships of an unconventional family, missing a key father figure, and the way the society shaped the lives of Pakistani people back in the day.

Overall, this was a highly enjoyable read, but I, personally would've enjoyed it more without the occasional bland chapters and with an addition of a climax.

The ending was great though: "Samar Api, your Amitabh is here!" Aww!

[Readerfromnyc · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ali Sethi is a supremely untalented writer. To say that the book overpromises and undelivers is inaccurate, for the book has almost nothing to do with what the synopsis claims. All that the book has are the ramblings of this 20-something-year-old about his childhood memories. This book should have never seen the light of day, at least not in its current scrambled and unedited form.

Sethi clearly comes from a connected south asian family, and pehaps that's all it takes to get a south asian book out--and connected to the extent that this "boy" is now apparently making music in Pakistan. I have no doubt he will soon have a music record to show for it as well, but I am also as sure that he is as true to his music as he is to his writing.

[Sara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read Ali Sethi’s The Wishmaker more for a very detailed glimpse of life in modern day Pakistan, and less for a textbook representation of plot progression. The book centers on a family, and opens with preparations for a wedding. During the course of the novel we are given many stories surrounding the family and its members. The story is narrated through the eyes of college graduate Zaki, but it becomes clear that the heart of the family is its strong women.

This was my first dose of Pakistani literature, and overall I was fascinated by the elements of cultural in particular the influence of traditional Islamic values and how they clashed with the metropolitan city of Lahore. I admit, at times it was confusing, keeping the characters straight and not getting lost amongst the dozens of subplots. The Wishmaker is a lot to take in, but it is a unique and successful depiction of the evolution of today’s Pakistani lifestyle—an impressive debut.

[Darshayita Thakur · Rating 4 out of 5]

I chose this book for my read from Pakistan.
Zaki Shirazi is surrounded by opinionated, powerful women, be it his Mother, his Dadi, or Samar Api (his cousin).

There is no distinct plot to this story and I can see why that might be a con for some readers. The book reads like a late night talk you would have with your friend whom you have not met with for over a year, just catching up on life. Zaki narrates the entire tale, not only of himself and Samar, but he goes way back to how his parents and Grand-parents met, he also recounts Daadi's experience as a teenager during the partition. This is the part that I liked the most.

Two children (Daadi as a child and her Hindu neighbor, who was also her friend - Amrita) arguing, who killed first, Hindus or Muslims, who got killed in larger numbers, get caught in between the air of partition brought about by a third party, as if drawing a line will separate the soil we all grew up on. Lahore doesn't feel much different that Amritsar or say, Old Delhi. I don't know if I'll ever be able to visit Pakistan but it sure does feel like I should.

Could there be Eid without Holi and Diwali, Noor Jehan without all-India Radio, Daadi without Amrita in the mornings?

Might I also add that the same quote applies, were the festivals reversed in the order they appear here.

What stood out the most is that the author did not make any attempt to westernize his writing; you won't find the meaning of a Shalwar Kameez written in parentheses or a glossary for the Urdu words used. You take it as it is. Else, where is the true purpose of reading diverse books if the reader is spoon-fed a customized culture reference to make their reading experience easier and pleasant. ( I also found this observation of mine reflected in one of the many reviews on Goodreads )

As a non-native English speaker there have been several instances where I have had to stop in between lines and search up a word to get the appropriate context. I believe it is high time that World Literature stops westernizing itself.

Many would feel that this book just dabbles on, but Desi's know that there's a distinct flavour to this particular type of story-telling, very much inspired from our day to day lives, when our Naanis, Maasis, Buas all meet and catch up with each other.

WRITING : 5/5
CHARACTERS : 4/5
PLOT : 3/5
OVERALL SATISFACTION : 4/5
FINAL RATING : 4/5

[Tori · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is kind of a hard review to write for me because I love Ali Sethi.

And I don't mean love as in "he's cool and he does good stuff"... I mean I LOVE ALI SETHI. If he showed up at my door and was like "I may be gay as a spring day, but come with me now" I wouldn't even bother to put on shoes... I'd just go. Peace out, bitches. Mama is going home.

So, I really wanted to love this book and be able to rave about how the man is perfect–writer, singer, cultural mover and shaker... but alas!

While there were definitely moments where Sethi's language was pure poetry, truly beautiful, they were few and far between. The characters, though they did keep my interest, remained flat and hard to fully love throughout, and the strange first person omniscient narrator made me question what I was reading... are the memories/flashbacks truly omniscient? Or are these what Zaki perceives happened, or wishes had happened?

Which brings me to my real contention... While the title is "The Wish Maker", I didn't really feel like that came through enough. Each POV character at some point makes a wish, but it didn't carry the kind of gravity I would expect if that was really the big theme of the book. I guess Samar Api gets her wish in the end, but it never had the weight I would expect.

Still, the subtle queer perspective and the quieter themes- political turmoil informing everyday life, feminism, the tension between rural and urban existence... all these were so well done and compassionately handled. I found myself, more than anything else, seeing the story as something that REALLY happened, that was really taking place. It felt very immediate, even if it was not smoothly wrought.

There are a lot of things here to unpack and I almost want to say that this was too ambitious for a first go at a book. This could even be a connected series if it wanted to be, with generations of stories hiding between the lines. I wanted to go deeper but kept finding only the bottom and having to come back up for air...

I know Ali Sethi is focusing on music more now and isn't very active in the West, but I think his literary voice is necessary and vital, even if this book is not perfect. I hope someday he decides to share it again and I look forward to seeing how age matures his writing.

Did I mention how much I love him? The man has the face of heaven.

[Paras · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Wish Maker is a tale of an upper middle class Pakistani family run by strong willed women from the point of view of young Zaki who is observant and silent, trying to search for a place in his family and fit in.

What I absolutely loved about the book was the fact that it was not only a coming of age story of a young Pakistani (read Lahori) boy but also a road down the memory lane of 60s and 70s—when liberalism was at its peak, partying and alcohol was not a problem, to when Bhutto was tried in the courts and people were showing their reactions—and late 80s, when there was strong censorship and Islamization (ban on alcohol and the like); change of governments in 90s and Zaki’s family reactions brought a similar wave of nostalgia (although I was very young in 90s and remember very little, mostly from the discussions of elders).
Other than his witty observance of the political scene, growing up of Zaki and Samar Apa in 90s (along with their friends) brought back sweet wistfulness of 90s when kids would regularly visit each other house, cousins would stay over nights, movies would be rented and watched on VCR, TV antennas would be fixed for channels and then Dish Satellite would replace antenna, one landline would be owned by every house and everyone house member would use only that, and later when the emergence of internet Chat rooms was supposedly the coolest thing in the crowd.
Zaki and Samar Api’s relationship throughout the book is one of the many reasons why one cannot put the book back without finishing. Samar Api is older, condescending and intimidating for Zaki but that does not lessen Zaki’s love for her. Zaki is Samar Api’s minion (no matter how harsh Samar Api could be sometimes to him). He does what she says and does not interrupt or correct her even if he knows she is making a mistake. He accompanies her in all her reckless adventures and decisions and keeps her secrets even if it means compromising the truth. The end does not end well for either of them. But for Zaki, Samar Api changes his life in one way or the other.
The Wish Maker although a work of fiction is a glaring truth of the events that were before partition (in Lahore) and that occurred right after partition (the fleeing of Sikhs and Hindus, killing of Muslims and Hindus on both sides of the borders) to the way politics impacted the life of rich and the poor in 70s, late 80s and 90s (there is a little glimpse of life in Pakistan after 9/11 as well); which makes is closer to relate—something that lacks in a lot of writings.
One thing that makes this book a little foreign for a Pakistani reader could be the that sometimes while reading, it feels like Ali Sethi has probably written this book as if his audience is non-Pakistani and foreign where he has to explain every tradition and every gesture (such as Azaan) in a simpler, comical way which takes away the desi beauty of it. Otherwise the flow of the story is simple yet magical to grip the attention of the reader till the end.

[Umar Tosheeb · Rating 4 out of 5]

I should warn you right away, this book doesn't have a lot of suspense, you don't have to wait for what might happen in the end.The novel is about an upper middle class family in Lahore. It is similar to a lot of other novels coming out from Pakistan since 2000. The writer growing up in Pakistan, going to colleges in America, and to a lesser extent in Britain, coming back, and writing books in English.
After the protagonist in this novel comes back from America, he narrates his life growing up, his parents' life, especially his mom's, and his grandparent's.
There's quite a lot on the politics of the county, especially during the 80s and 90s. The author's focus is this upper call family and their sheltered environment. There's almost nothing on other people--their servants--their lives, their struggles. It's probably because other than the western audience, the vast majority of people in Pakistan who would read this book, will also belong to that small elite class.
The flaw in this novel is that author doesn't deeply divulge into lives of characters, I felt the description of almost all the characters is at the superficial level. I didn't get to see why people did what they did, they just did it.

[MasterSal]

Pakistani author writing a book set in Pakistan and not about the ABCD experience … sound so intriguing. Also the low rating makes me even more curious.

I will say that I am a fan of the author who is also a singer so I am more than likely positivity biased

[Anum · Rating 1 out of 5]

Reading this book is the productive equivalent of staring at a blank white wall and watching paint dry. I think I ultimately finished it only because I hate to DNF, because there's not much else that would motivate one to. There is no discernible plot or purpose behind the story, just aimless drivel. The characters are all tolerable but unremarkable.

At the end of the book, when asked, I had no idea what the plot or story had been. Surely there was one, but whatever little the author might have wanted to say blurs in the tedium of the storytelling style. Trying to read it feels like sitting beside a stranger on a bus and listening to them tell their entire life story, disjointedly and extensively.

First books are occasionally not great indicators of a writer's eventual repertoire—I sincerely hope such is the case for Sethi. If you're looking for a cultural kick (or even desi familiarity), the book does give pretty open insight into Lahore from a few decades ago. Otherwise, would not recommend.

[Ming · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a first novel by this author. I believe that the story is good. The writing is somewhat uneven. Parts of it seem irrelevant or insubstantial for the story. The overall flow is stilted. There are portions that are poetic and evocative. Also, there are some parts that nicely portray or provide cultural background and practices.

[Erin · Rating 2 out of 5]

I thought this book was going to tell a beautiful story like The Kite Runner. I learned a bit about the political history of Pakistan which was intresting but the story telling was boring. It really dragged out. It took me forever to get through this book.

[Connie · Rating 1 out of 5]

I just plain did not like this book. There were lots of characters who were just "there" with no explanation as to who they were or their relationship to the other characters or the story. I didn't, couldn't get through the book.

[jojo · Rating 4 out of 5]

slice of life plotless and living their lives, kinda confused at points when settings and situations changed without warning but not too hard to catch on, writing is very pretty and some cool links between the stories

[Judy · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was reading this book; was about one-third through -- I had a hard time "getting into it." So far, the characters, and especially the main character, are not appealing; I can't seem to find a well defined plot yet. However, I'll read it through to the end before I make a final judgment. Unfortunately, I have not enjoyed reading the book, so much so that it has been an ordeal to pick it up and try again. I thought it would fit in well with the previous books I had just finished reading: Shantaram, A Fine Balance, The Slumdog Millionaire, The White Tiger, and Unaccustomed Earth. I put aside Sacred Games to read The Wish Maker. I am stopping on page 107, and am not going to read any more of it. In my lifetime, I have not finished approximately six books, once started. There are two reasons that I think this book has turned me off. First, I cannot find the plot! If it is there, it has escaped me. When friends ask me what the book is about, I have to tell them that I simply do not know. And, the characters are the second reason -- their lack of development is discouraging! I do not "know" any of them. They are not likeable or dislikeable because I can't make such a judgment without information about who they are, what they are thinking and feeling. A "litany" of what they are doing is insufficient; conversation does not add to my knowledge of who they are. The author does provide some "pretty phrases," but they are not sufficient for plowing ahead for another 300 pages. Thus, this book, for me, is not only not a keeper; it is not a book I will finish reading or recommend to others.

[Sakib · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mixed feelings about this book. Some parts I loved, other parts not so much.

Firstly, a disclaimer of my bias - I read this whilst I visited Lahore and Pakistan for the first time. This book, also set mostly in Lahore, therefore connected with me in a special way - I knew, and could see on a daily basis, some of the things he described and alluded to.

What I loved about this book was how Ali Sethi was able to capture the energy and complexity of Pakistan, and the various mindsets of its people. He does so implicitly and poetically, in a way I think that non-Pakistanis/South Asians may not get (and that may be the reason for so many bad reviews). I enjoyed this a lot.

I did find the book very long - I did skim over some parts - and at times, jarring. I read some paragraphs >5 times over and still didn't get it, for example. I just didn't get what Ali was trying to say.

There isn't an explicit "plot" that develops - we're just taken on a journey through the lives of the characters in the book. Often, the stories of each of these characters were fascinating. But sometimes I found that we were being taken on a journey that just didn't make sense: I didn't understand the significance or point of why we were being told things. Maybe that's just me.

Overall, an interesting book. One I'd recommend to read if you have a connection to Pakistan.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Want to actually give it 3.5 stars. Enjoyed the prose and the events of the book but like a lot of other reviewers pointed out, there was a void in the place of a plot. In the nicest way possible, this was a bit of pointless book. I meandered through the pages pretty aimlessly, and enjoyed myself, but reached the bittersweet last page without being cognizant of a story. And that's okay I guess, not every book needs to have a concrete story; or maybe I am just a giant, irrevocable, Ali Sethi simp.
However, I highly suspect that a lot of the other criticism I've read stems from non-desis not understanding the context of this very brown book.
Either way, it was nice to pass the time with, and I did feel that familiar sense of mourning every time one comes to the end of a good book.

[Pooja T · Rating 3 out of 5]

Started off brilliantly, I loved the writing and was enjoying most of the stories about various characters, but somewhere around the middle of this novel, I was a little disconnected and frankly a little bored. Read the rest of book in a bit of a rush. It was an overall decent read but it had potential to be better.

[Amy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Zzzzzzzzz.....If you liked "Love in the Time of Cholera," you'll love "The Wish Maker".

[Danial Tanvir · Rating 5 out of 5]

this is a book about modern pakistan , some parts were well written and nice.

[Sophia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hmmm. I would call this less of a novel, more of a description of Pakistani sentimentality and a tour of Pakistani day-to-day life through different generations. I love Ali Sethi and I think that’s an understatement. As a singer, this man is gold. He’s incredibly talented. As a writer, he HAS a gift with words and descriptions and pulling the reader into his world. I felt like I was there. The problem? As a Pakistani-American, I had no difficulty sinking into his world, the Pakistani in me feeling sentimental/enthusiastic about his references (Heading to Off Beat with a list for a mixed tape, mangoes, restaurants, etc) and the American in me impressed with his references towards and knowledge of Teach For America (and other references). The problem is that.....that’s all there is. Descriptions, references, the main characters acting like normal spoiled brats, the adults acting like empty-headed brats.......but where was the story? What was the POINT? Why is our main character SO unlikable? Questions are never answered - what happened to Choti? Who does Samar marry? What. Is. The. POINT? Why did I read this long novel? I don’t know - this book gives zero closure for the little story it has. This is a book that was on my list (and physical bookshelf) for a long time and I was excited about reading it - so I feel let down. I’m giving it 3 Stars, because the writing is nice and it transported me back to a simpler time. But as a fiction novel, it’s lacking a STORY.

[Shreela Sen · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Wish Maker is narrated by Zaki, a boy whose mother is a Magazine publisher, a staunch supporter of Benazir Bhutto. It is a "drama"/contemporary fiction category, it follows the lives of three women - Zaki's mother, (his own age) aunt, & his grandmother, besides Zaki's own life.

Through these 3 generations, & also touching upon Zaki's other grandparents, his cousins, his aunt's mother, & some of his friends, the book puts up a picture of life in Pakistan through the times, which, we find, is much like anywhere else - "the political is personal" only for the passionate - like Zaki's mother. For others life just goes on.

The language is engaging, the teens, of all generations, are relatable even though they live in circumstances very different from ours. It is a pleasant read, on the whole.

It sometimes feels strange that a boy should know such intimate details about his mother, (his cousin-cum-Best friend - okay, perhaps his grandmother too, old people are often expansive & sometimes reminiscing,) & that is the one minus point about this book.

The other is that the novel, altogether, is too placid, not intense enough, not enough "happens".

The author is two years younger than me, & like many debut novels, this is semi-autobiographical. I should also say that I am more familiar with some Urdu/Hindi words, than a person from other parts of the world would be, & would therefore find a little difficult to proceed with reading.

[Ali F · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really wanted to like this book. All the makings of a beautiful, personal story are there — interesting, full characters, a complex backdrop, and real relationships. But instead everything is … boring. Everything is written in a passive tone (I suspect for stylistic effect to speak to some sense of all the characters “performing”, but in a way that becomes grating). Stories are shared without discussion; characters are introduced and dropped without any real focus on depth. The focus is often haphazard, and honestly, Sethi seems too timid to actually take his story for a ride. Zaki, Samar, Zakia, etc. all the core characters have so much to say but instead we’re left to muse about them as they lurch from plot point to plot point, or disappear altogether. It feels like a lot of haphazard exposition building up to… nothing.

It's a pity, there's a lot here that would make a literary nut excited: every character seems to come in pairs, often converging or diverging and defining each other; every character also seems interested in constantly performing who they think they ought to be, or who might make them happy; and the general themes of adolescent anger and confusion and loss are all there. None of it ever really comes together though.

Maybe his next book.

[Yumna · Rating 2 out of 5]

the problem with diaspora-coded books is that sometimes it’s hard to tell who it was written for. some parts felt overly explanatory which makes me feel like it was written for maybe a white audience. but other parts felt under explained as if it was written for a pakistani audience who’s in the know,,,

but my biggest issue was that it felt surprisingly un-relatable,,, i barley felt represented in a book about generational trauma within a pakistani family as someone who is literally in that position myself 😶 honestly this just made me wanna reread fatima farheen mirza’s a place for us because that was Giving!! lol

wasn’t a fan of the writing style. idk how to describe it but it felt like the details were being presented more like facts,,, there weren’t any lines that stuck with me. i mean i know it’s a debut novel so i guess i can let that slide but i didn’t care about any of the characters which was unfortunate,,,

ali baby i’m so sorry you’re a brilliant musician and i’m so glad you found your calling truly but this wasn’t it king i’m sorry i still love you tho 😭

[Bibliophiles · Rating 2 out of 5]

I love Sethi's music, and as a fellow desi queer person, wanted to love this book. However, that was impossible, given how the PoV skips all over the place, and how mundane, frankly, the narrative is. Nothing really happens: relatives gather, food is eaten, things are purchased, people talk about the horrible political situation in Pakistan. Women are treated badly. There is surreptitious purchase and consumption of alcohol. People watch trashy B'wood movies and fall in love with unattractive actors. There is some very vague teenage rebellion that is promptly quenched. Then, things end happily(ish). The queer bits in the narrative are almost invisible, which is funny given how much gay sex happens in Pakistan.

Frankly, my own life has an out young gay person in 2000s in the subcontinent was a LOT more exciting than this. Maybe *I* should get a MFA from an elite American uni and then write a book commemorating my somewhat tumultuous young adulthood. It would be more exciting than this anodyne pap.

[emaⁿ · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book almost 12 years ago and I'm sittin here penning a review for the first time. I really don't know what to tell you except it's one I've read over and over and over. The way Sethi describes the family, the setup of the house, the city, everything! The main character's life is not exactly conventional but everyone (Pakistani!) can relate to some of the things he endures at one point or another. And I feel that was the beauty in it. You see this story of a boy and his family who are not undergoing massive levels of tragedy but you do not hold it against them for the sort of person they become, because each of them are allowed the luxury of explanation. You get mad at the grandmother for being Like That, and then you are offered a look into why she is Like That. You get frustrated with the mom, and then you see the buildup of things that led to her being this way.

If you're not a Pakistani, or South Asian at the very least, you will have a hard time connecting with this book. Stop leaving bad reviews.