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A gripping thriller about nightmare neighbours, Those People Next Door explores the loss of innocence and how far we’re prepared to go to defend ourselves and the people we love.
Those People Next Door, by Kia Abdullah | Literary Review | Those People Next Door, by Kia Abdullah | Literary
Salma Khatun has moved to the suburban development of Blenheim, together with her husband Bil and teenage son Zain. This is meant to be a move for the better, a safe environment where her son will no longer be under the influence of boys who were in the process of leading him astray. He’d already been thrown out of college and this was to be a new start. Salma Khatun is extremely hopeful about Blenheim, the safe suburban development to which she, her husband and their son have just moved. Their family is in desperate need of a fresh start, and Blenheim feels like the place to make that happen.
In this story we follow two families. Salma, Bil and their son Zain, who are the new family on the street, and Tom, Willa and their son Jamie, long-time neighborhood residents. The Khatun family decides to move to Blenheim for a fresh start, hoping to protect their son from the wrong crowd he was involved with in their old neighborhood, and to enjoy a more peaceful and civilized lifestyle, even though buying a new house may ruin them financially. It's quite a change from the "We're all in it together" that filled British movies from the start of the war to the end. This makes full use of snobbery, both of the upper classes towards the working folks, and that of the lower class Charles Victor, full of Bolshie contempt for the uppers, and yet always ready to cadge whatever he fancies, from a beer to Warner's reading glasses. Warner has his own pride, thinking himself as good as any man and twice as good as most, and his women folk the best of all.
Those People Next Door | Kia Abdullah | 9780008433703 - NetGalley Those People Next Door | Kia Abdullah | 9780008433703 - NetGalley
Favourite joke - the butcher is saving us a sheep's head, and he's leaving the eyes in, why?, to see us through the week, lol.A few months ago, this book's very discriminatory publisher declined my NetGalley request to review this audiobook which, ironically, was a book about discrimination and rejection.
Those People Next Door – HarperCollins Publishers UK Those People Next Door – HarperCollins Publishers UK
You know it’s only a matter of time before someone gets seriously hurt. No one can come out of this conflict unscathed. Like a runaway train, there is nothing you can do to stop it. Not long after they move in, Salma spots her neighbour, Tom Hutton, ripping out the anti-racist banner her son put in their front garden. She chooses not to confront Tom because she wants to fit in. It's a small thing, really. No need to make a fuss. So Salma takes the banner inside and puts it in her window instead. But the next morning she wakes up to find her window smeared with paint.I'm not totally familiar with housing developments in the UK so I had trouble picturing what type of situation the Khatuns lived in, past and present. In Blenheim I picture what we call a semi-detached home in a neighbourhood controlled by a homeowners type association which aren't very common in Canada unless it's a condominium.
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