Brown Boy: A Memoir

“I was torn within myself, trying to be two people at once,” writes Aziz, a lawyer and former foreign policy adviser for Justin Trudeau’s administration in Canada, in this striking debut. Raised in 1990s suburban Toronto as the son of Pakistani Muslim immigrants, Aziz confesses to being an “apathetic” student before he watched then–presidential candidate Barack Obama give a speech on CNN. He was, he writes, struck by their similarities: “the immigrant father, the feeling of being stuck between worlds, the search for roots, the need to connect to something outside himself.” After graduating from Cambridge University and Yale Law School, Aziz returned to Canada in 2017 and became a foreign policy adviser in the Canadian government, but after experiencing escalating microaggressions from white coworkers, he resigned “with my dignity intact.” In 2021, a trip to Pakistan allowed him to reconnect with his culture: “I was reclaiming some pieces of history all for myself.” Aziz maintains a sharp awareness as he confronts his “immigrant boy’s need to eat pain and keep going” and celebrates his heritage (“The canvas given to me from before my birth had already been beautiful”). The result, a sterling portrait of personal revelation, cuts to the bone. Agent: Bonnie Nadell, Hill Nadell Literary Agency. (Apr.)