Laughing All the Way to the Mosque

A hilarious memoir about growing up Muslim in a household where, according to Zarqa’s father, the Quran says it's okay to eat at McDonald's—but only if you order the McFish Zarqa Nawaz has always straddled two cultures. She's just as likely to be agonizing over which earrings will "pimp out" her hijab as to be flirting with the Walmart meat manager in a futile attempt to secure halal chicken the day before Eid. Little Mosque on the Prairie brought Zarqa's own laugh-out-loud take on her everyday culture clash to viewers around the world. And now, in Laughing All the Way to the Mosque, she tells the sometimes absurd, sometimes challenging stories of being Zarqa in a western society. From explaining to the plumber why the toilet must be within arm's reach of the tap (hint: it involves a watering can and the Muslim obsession with cleanliness "down there") to refusing to use an outhouse for fear of Jinn possession, Zarqa paints an eye-opening—and often eye-rolling—portrait of a proud (if slightly neurotic) Muslim woman.