Alif the Unseen by G. Willow Wilson. Alif's comfortable existence, living at home with his mother while spending his time coding protective software to keep his many anonymous, freedom or pornography-loving hacker clients secure, comes to an abrupt end when his beloved Intisar becomes engaged to a wealthy prince. Unfortunately, the lucky suitor is also the head of state cyber security forces, which are going to breach all of Alif's carefully coded defenses. What's worse, the Hand, as he is known, has also discovered Alif's latest programming triumph--a keystroke logging program, which has the potential to unmask and destroy all of Alif's unconventional clients as well as Alif himself. As Alif's friend, Dina, puts it, "We live in a city run by an emir from one of the most inbred families on earth, where a few censors can throw someone in jail for writing things on the Internet and falling in love with the wrong person. . . It [Alif's life]went out of control a long time ago." (122)
When she decided to leave him, Intisar sent Alif a package containing a book, The Thousand and One Days. This ancient tome, the secret book of the jinn, is believed to contain the key to creating a quantum-bit-powered supercomputer. With the help of Dina and a deadly jinn named Vikram, Alif struggles to keep the Hand from finding the book while he uses fleeting wifi connections to do some manic programming aimed at destroying the Hand's power.
The book is replete with fascinating characters who offer different takes on Islam and spirituality, on tensions between the haves and have-nots in an unnamed Arab country, on the differences between Arabs and half-castes (Alif is half-Arab, half-Indian), and on two worlds--of the jinn and of the Internet, that operate out of sight of ordinary lives. Fascinating, fast paced and totally satisfying. Don't miss this one!!
