Wave - Diana Farid

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Author: Diana Farid

Narrator: Diana Farid
Genre: Novel-in-verse, Middle-grade fiction
Rating: 4.25 stars.

In a Nutshell: A middle-grade novel-in-verse that covers quite a lot of serious themes and does justice to almost all of them.

Story:
1987, Southern California. Thirteen year old Ava loves many things things: surfing with her best friend Phoenix, singing, reading poems by Rumi. Unfortunately, she doesn’t enjoy the field of medicine but her doctor-mom has clear plans for her future. She sets up Ava to spend the summer volunteering at the hospital she works for, such that Ava can also become a doctor. (“If you are a doctor, you will always have find a job.”) Ava tries to balance her passion for her hobbies with her supposed responsibility towards keeping her single mom satisfied. To add to the issues, Phoenix’s cancer, which has been in remission, is back with a vengeance. This is turning out to be a summer vacation Ava simply doesn’t want to face.
The story is written in verse style, with quick poems covering a multitude of feelings and issues.


The approach of the book towards its content is quite paradoxical. On the one hand, it is written in a language exactly suiting its target age group of middle graders. Simple words, smooth flow, issues they can identify with. On the other hand, it covers such deep themes that one can’t help being stimulated into thought.

There is a whole range of topics included: parental divorce, OCD, poetry, singing, surfing, life-threatening illness, friendship, and parental expectations. Each of these, though discrete, is woven so well into the tapestry of the book that the result is a mellifluous harmony surging with the voice of a young girl struggling to find her place in the world. As she says in one of the verses, she is “not Persian enough at home, not American enough at the beach.” The cover page and the title reflect Ava’s love for the waves, and these is a recurrent idea in many of the poems.

While there is a small part about Ava’s mom having migrated from Iran before the revolution changed the country, the book doesn’t delve much into immigrant issues, which suited me perfectly. I was initially not a fan of cancer being written into the story but the author does complete justice to it and doesn’t milk the pain to enhance the impact. This isn’t Phoenix’s story but Ava’s, and the focus stays on Ava and her feelings right till the end.

The audiobook clocks at 3.5 hours and is narrated by the author herself. I am usually not a fan of books narrated by non-celebrity authors because they might write fabulously but most of them can’t perform. As such, the narration often sounds drab or monotonous. This book is a big exception. Diana Farid narrates the book with such beauty that even I, a person with not a single poetic bone in my body, understood the verses and their underlying pathos. Her voice has a lovely cadence and she enunciates every word clearly. Moreover, as she herself is the poet, she knows just where to stress and where to pause for effect. I would definitely recommend this book in audio format.

All in all, if a poetically-challenged person such as Yours Truly enjoyed this middle-grade novel-in-verse, it definitely has a lot going for it. Recommended for sure.

My thanks to RB Media and NetGalley for the ALC of “Wave”. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the audiobook.

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