The Coin
By Yasmin Zaher
The Coin by Yasmin Zaher is easily one of my favorite novels of the year because it contains the two things I love most: a surreal plot with an unhinged protagonist.
The story begins with an unnamed Palestinian woman living in NYC who’s obsessed with dirt. She abhors its ubiquity and all the places it can seep into: nails, clothes, the dark corners of the room. Naturally this one-sided rivalry clashes with her NYC lifestyle, but rather than succumb to a filth-induced ennui; she carves out power for herself as a teacher in an upscale elementary school where her students become her subjects, tools for her ego, and she gradually molds them in her image.
Though her methods are self-serving, and at times discriminatory (the protagonist herself has expressed her disdain for the poor, Mexicans, immigrants, brown people, etc…) there’s a universal appeal to her. Because as Zaher reminds, there are many ways that the disempowered react to global horrors. Sometimes they’re …
