New Book Alert: The Unseen Path by Zlaikha Y. Samad and L'mere Younossi; Sequel to The Unseen Blossom Reveals The Real World Surrounding The Fantasy

 

New Book Alert: The Unseen Path by Zlaikha Y. Samad and L'mere Younossi; Sequel to The Unseen Blossom Reveals The Real World Surrounding The Fantasy

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

Spoilers: In 2019, I had the pleasure of reading my favorite book of that year and one of my all-time favorites since this blog began, The Unseen Blossom by Zlaikha Y. Samad and L'mere Younossi. This stunningly beautiful and allegorical love story is set in Afghanistan and stars Zuli and Lamar. In a modern day fairy tale, the duo are given a task to search for a fig blossom. They travel through various dream like landscapes and are aided by magical guides before they reach the end of their quest and find love with each other. They are also given a much larger task of sharing the lessons that they learned about love and empathy with the world. I did not exaggerate when I described The Unseen Blossom as "walking into someone else's dream." 

Well, I now have the pleasure of reviewing The Unseen Path, the sequel, and it's a thorny pleasure. Not because it's a bad book. In fact, it's just the opposite. However, if The Unseen Blossom is a fantastic dream, then The Unseen Path is what happens after the dreamer wakes up and reality sets in. The Unseen Path shows us the real Afghanistan in which Zuli and Lamar live. It is a world in which it is difficult to share such a fantastic journey among intense poverty and strict laws, a romance between lovers of different social classes, and ideas of empathy and love that are hard to share in a country that is torn apart by war.

The book begins where The Unseen Blossom ends. Zuli and Lamar have returned from their journey.There is a strong tonal shift in the book that is both jarring, but at the same time realistic in how quickly the world can change for people. The first half of the book somewhat retains the fantastic elements of the previous book, though bordering more on romantic comedy rather than fantasy. There are Zuli's regal but distant parents who are bound by tradition. There is Zuli's loyal maternal nanny, Gulnar. There are some seriocomic moments that illustrate the class differences between the pair.

 It seems that Samad and Younossi are invoking a Jane Austen-esque comedy of manners involving star crossed lovers. 

Then reality crashes in and the Reader is aware that this book is set Afghanistan in 1979.

The Soviet-Afghan War is foreshadowed in the first half of the book by rumors of war. Zuli's father, the king, fears that Russia may invade. But like a murderer in a movie that is first introduced as an extra where the audience's focus is on the lovers in the foreground, these rumors are mere whispers or dark clouds on the horizon. Only in hindsight, after a second reading, do those dark clouds become important.

Once war hits, it does so in a way that catapults Zuli, Lamar, and the Reader headlong into reality. There is so much grief and anguish, partly because it is so unexpected. The destroyed buildings which only chapters before held such friendly people are reduced to rubble. People like Zuli and Lamar make every day plans to get together, go to work, share a drink, or just hang out only to be cruelly ripped apart possibly never to see each other again. 

It would be tempting to make Zuli and Lamar soldiers, warriors, and hell bent on revenge against the people who destroyed their country (and really who could blame them?). But that path would contradict the lessons that they learned in The Unseen Blossom. They use their talents, abilities, and personalities to aid the people around them. To provide healing, education, empathy, and love through their actions. They are learning to put into practical use the lessons that they have been taught. Those lessons take them through the immense grief and suffering that surround them.

Is The Unseen Path a better book than The Unseen Blossom? Well, they are so different that it's almost like comparing two completely different entities. Even though they are written by the same authors, featuring the same deuteragonist characters, and carry similar themes. The Unseen Blossom is a one of a kind spiritual fantasy into a dream world. The Unseen Path shows one how to put the love, magic, and kindness that is shown in the dream world into the real one. It shows how one can turn that fantasy into reality and plant the blossom that grows a better world.