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  • The Tyrant’s Daughter by J. C Carleson
  • Karen Coats
Carleson, J. C. The Tyrant’s Daughter. Knopf, 2014. [304p]. Library ed. ISBN 978-0-449-80998-3 $20.99 Trade ed. ISBN 978-0-449-80997-6 $17.99 Reviewed from galleys R Gr. 7-10.

Fifteen-year-old Laila has always lived in isolated luxury in the fictional Middle Eastern country where her father was, she believed, the king. When her father is killed, she, her mother, and her six-year-old brother escape to the U.S., which sees her father as a tyrant who maintained power by torturing and killing his own people. An open-hearted American girl, Emmy, takes Laila on as a project, and Laila, who resents the restrictions placed on women in her home country, guardedly experiments with an American identity. More importantly, though, she learns about her father’s regime and the even stricter one her uncle is now attempting to impose. She finds that her mother has struck a deal with a CIA agent to secure their safety, but she needs to decide for herself which side she is on and what she will risk to intervene in dangerous political dynamics. Pulling from a tangle of real-world scenarios, Carleson draws on her experiences as a CIA officer to create Laila as a privileged but thoughtful young woman who had no context for understanding her situation until she came to the U.S. Her conflicts with friends as well as with her politically savvy mother are recognizably teen, but it’s also clear that she doesn’t share the naïve openness of her American agemates. Ultimately, while she is compassionate regarding the suffering her father has caused, she understands that she must be as crafty and duplicitous as the mother she critiques if she is going [End Page 305] to make any difference at all. Timely, relevant, and fascinating, Laila’s story offers readers an accessible understanding of the seemingly intractable nature of Middle East politics. An equally fascinating additional note by Dr. Cheryl Benard offers more real-world context for Laila’s fictional but very credible position. Resources for further research are included.

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