Metea Valley was pleased to welcome best-selling and award-winning author Sabaa Tahir on Thursday morning. The author visit took place in the large forum room, where Tahir conversed with her Metea Valley fans upon the journey of writing both her novels “Ember in the Ashes” and “A Torch Against the Night.” Tahir’s expedition encompassed one of adversity, as it is what inspired her novels and the larger purpose of understanding the world today through young adult fantasy.
Tahir started out the visit with briefly explaining her books in which a female character, Laia, ekes out an existence in ancient Rome’s impoverished backstreets with her grandparents and brother. They don’t challenge the Martial empire, for they risk execution if they do. Despite this, Laia attempts to save her brother, who has been arrested by the empire for treason, with help from the rebels. This help comes with a price of her spying within the Empire’s greatest military academy.
The visit revealed her journey of life experiences to both her novels that gave the books a whole new meaning and allowed Mustang fans a new perspective to look from.
“We’ve been looking for an author with not only diverse material, but a diverse background, whether it’s culture or her work at the Washington Post. I think that it’s the best thing to benefit from others’ experiences, especially for Metea students,” LMC director Debbie Turner said.
Tahir discussed what it truly means to be a warrior and to be human at the same time, whether being a soldier, a parent, or a child in a country at war. Tahir began to understand and learn the oppression and struggles that people face nationally, and wanted to implement this, along with a warrior-like essence, into her novels when she gives her characters the opportunity to win in a fiction life whereas people in real life might not.
Out of the many research Tahir had to do for her series, she interviewed an FBI agent in order to get an idea of what a warrior is for a character like Laia. Though, instead of talking about thrilling and suspenseful moments like Tahir thought the agent would, the FBI agent spoke about her custody battle “It made me realize that i hadn’t seen her as human until that point when she told me that. I kept on seeing her as a warrior, as a thing”, Tahir said.
Before answering questions, she expanded on the issues individuals face throughout the world. Tahir and her novels took inspiration upon a story at the Washington Post where she used to work at. The story was about women in Kashmir, South Asia who have to live with the fact their loved ones have been taken away by local military forces, and don’t know if their loved ones are dead, imprisoned, or being tortured.
“I think it was my frustration with the state of the world that made me decide to write a story in which a girl’s brother is taken from her, and she tries to fight back and I knew that in our world it wouldn’t happen; my brother would be taken and I would be screwed,” Tahir said.
Tahir also talked about growing up in California’s Mojave Desert, where her family owned an eighteen-room motel. Although an isolated area, it was crowded with people and racism towards her and her family due to her Pakistani heritage.
“I remember this feeling of having no voice, [and] no power. I never really stood up for myself or my family,” Tahir said.
From this, she took comfort in books and journalism where her voices were heard. Later, these voices became louder and louder in her novels that had a journey to a larger worldly purpose which she can now share with her fans.
