It Won't Always Be Like This (Graphic Novel)

- Blurb -

An intimate graphic memoir about an American girl growing up with her Egyptian father' s new family, forging unexpected bonds and navigating adolescence in an unfamiliar country-from the award-winning author of I Was Their American Dream. ; ;"What a joy it is to read Malaka Gharib' s It Won' t Always Be Like This, to have your heart expertly broken and put back together within the space of a few panels, to have your wonder in the world restored by her electric mind. "-Mira Jacob, author of Good Talk- A Memoir in Conversations ; ;It' s hard enough to figure out boys, beauty, and being cool when you' re young, but even harder when you' re in a country where you don' t understand the language, culture, or social norms. ;;Nine-year-old Malaka Gharib arrives in Egypt for her annual summer vacation abroad and assumes it' ll be just like every other vacation she' s spent at her dad' s place in Cairo. But her father shares news that changes everything- He has remarried. Over the next fifteen years, as she visits her father' s growing family summer after summer, Malaka must reevaluate her place in his life. All that on top of maintaining her coolness!;;Malaka doesn' t feel like she fits in when she visits her dad--she sticks out in Egypt and doesn' t look anything like her fair-haired half siblings. But she adapts. She learns that Nirvana isn' t as cool as Nancy Ajram, that there' s nothing better than a Fanta and a melon-mint hookah, and that her new stepmother, Hala, isn' t so different from Malaka herself. ;;It Won' t Always Be Like This is a touching time capsule of Gharib' s childhood memories-each summer a fleeting moment in time-and a powerful reflection on identity, relationships, values, family, and what happens when it all collides.