Michael Muhammad Knight's The Taqwacores is a novel about a punk rock subset founded on observance of Islam. The word taqwa refers to a fear-based love or love-based fear, which is prescribed as the correct relationship to Allah. With characters like Umar, the dour, straight edge Sunni; Rabeya, the burqa-wearing riot grrl; Jehangir, the mohawked Sufi pothead, he successfully portrays a heresy-friendly, pluralist Islam that feels more like a family than a creed.
Michael Muhammad Knight made copies of The Taqwacores available free online before its acceptance and publication by by Soft Skull in 2004, with the result that a scene just like the fictional one he'd described came into existence—bands like The Kominas and Vote Hezbollah are examples—giving itself the name, "Taqwacore" after this book.
Read a review of Michael Muhammad Knight’s Impossible Man HERE
Read a review of his Osama Van Halen HERE
To read my interview with Michael Muhammad Knight, click HERE
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