Omar Rising by Aisha Saeed

Omar Rising by Aisha Saeed is an uplifting and heartwarming novel about a boy named Omar, who gets a scholarship to the acclaimed Ghalib Academy. It’s his chance to reverse his life and get a better one. Because Omar is the son of a servant, he will most likely have a low-paying job too. If he could graduate from Ghalib Academy, it would make his life much better, but when Omar gets there, he realizes that Ghalib will be much tougher than he thought.

When Omar gets to school on the first day, he heads straight for his dorms, hoping to get a room with Kareem, a scholar he met over the summer during orientation. Omar almost can’t believe his luck when he gets Kareem, and they instantly start chatting about what clubs they’re going to join and who they’re happy not to live with. However, within a month, most of their dreams get crushed in the hands of principal Moiz.

Moiz announces that first year scholars may not join clubs. That means no astronomy club and no soccer club. Omar is outraged and becomes even angrier when Moiz declares that all scholars must do five hours of public service every week on top of their already extremely busy schoolwork and keep an A+ average, or they will get kicked out of school.

Omar, Kareem, and the other scholars are devastated by the news, and become more depressed when they realize they will have to give up movie nights to study to keep learning at Ghalib. However, their extra studying hasn’t paid off. When the school counselor tells Omar that he will have to leave Ghalib Academy. Omar knows that he will have to change the corrupt system to get his dream job of being an astronomer. He and the rest of his grade organize a protest to show that they want the scholars to stay, that the system is unfair, and that unfair systems must be broken.

Saeed did a beautiful job writing this book. I really enjoyed her incorporation of Omar’s dream job, and she sprinkled some tidbits of space-related similes. She also did a beautiful job highlighting the more important parts of the novel. Additionally, Saeed described the characters’ personalities wonderfully so you could feel what they were like. Overall, this was a beautifully touching novel.