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Karina Ahmed has been exactly following her parents’ strict rules and expectations for her whole life. They’re Muslim and Bangladeshi, and she respects and loves her parents, her faith and cultural background. But Karina wants to be able to make some choices for herself. The big one is her future career. Her parents expect her to become a doctor. But she’s not as strong in math and science as her younger brother, and she just isn’t interested in medicine. What she would love to be able to do is major in English in college. But Karina knows her parents wouldn’t even entertain that idea for discussion, let alone allow her to do it.
When her parents travel to Bangladesh for four weeks to see family, Karina has some breathing room. Her beloved grandmother, Dadu, comes to stay with her and her brother, and she is warm, understanding and supportive of Karina’s interests and needs.
Then Karina’s English teacher asks her to tutor a student who needs help to pass an important exam at the end of the school year. She’s fine with that in principle — but the student in question is Ace Clyde, the bad boy of the school. He doesn’t interact with many people and he doesn’t seem to care much at all about studying. But Karina agrees to try to help him.
Naturally, the experience upends Karina’s life and gets her thinking even more about all the ways she’d like more freedom. For one, she really, really doesn’t want to study medicine, and she really, really doesn’t want to even try to have that conversation with her parents. And for another, she isn’t allowed to spend time with boys, let alone date. But as she does spend time with Ace (using excuses and taking advantage of her Dadu’s looser rules), she finds herself falling for him.
Each day, Karina is counting down until her parents’ return. She has less and less time to figure out how to take her own life into her hands. If she can muster the courage. But Ace is unexpectedly kind and supportive and believes she’s brave. Maybe, just maybe, she can forge her own path.
Counting Down with You is a sweet young adult romance. But it’s just as much or more a thoughtful exploration of how one teen figures out how to spread her wings while still respecting and honoring her family and culture. Tashie Bhuiyan writes in an introduction that this book is a way for her to express the kinds of things she went through as a “brown” young woman. It’s a very personal story. I appreciated the window she opened for readers to see into the lives of others like her. The characters are real; Karina is the focus, but Ace also has the opportunity to grow and find his own way in his family, which has its own expectations. It’s an authentic story with substance that speaks to the heart.
Rated: High. Profanity includes 17 uses of strong language, about 20 instances of moderate profanity, about 20 uses of mild language, and around 60 instances of the name of Deity in vain. Characters kiss, but nothing beyond that.
