A Good Country

My Life in Twelve Towns and the Devastating Battle for a White America

By: Sofia Ali-Khan

Narrated by: Kelsey Jaffer

Length: 16 hrs and 5 mins

Publisher's summary

A leading advocate for social justice excavates the history of forced migration in the twelve American towns she’s called home, revealing how White supremacy has fundamentally shaped the nation.

“At a time when many would rather ban or bury the truth, Ali-Khan bravely faces it in this bracing and necessary book.”—Ayad Akhtar, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Homeland Elegies

Sofia Ali-Khan’s parents emigrated from Pakistan to America, believing it would be a good country. With a nerdy interest in American folk history and a devotion to the rule of law, Ali-Khan would pursue a career in social justice, serving some of America’s most vulnerable communities. By the time she had children of her own—having lived, worked, and worshipped in twelve different towns across the nation—Ali-Khan felt deeply American, maybe even a little extra American for having seen so much of the country.

But in the wake of 9/11, and on the cusp of the 2016 election, Ali-Khan’s dream of a good life felt under constant threat. As the vitriolic attacks on Islam and Muslims intensified, she wondered if the American dream had ever applied to families like her own, and if she had gravely misunderstood her home.

In A Good Country, Ali-Khan revisits the color lines in each of her twelve towns, unearthing the half-buried histories of forced migration that still shape every state, town, and reservation in America today. From the surprising origins of America’s Chinatowns, the expulsion of Maroon and Seminole people during the conquest of Florida, to Virginia’s stake in breeding humans for sale, Ali-Khan reveals how America’s settler colonial origins have defined the law and landscape to maintain a White America. She braids this historical exploration with her own story, providing an intimate perspective on the modern racialization of American Muslims and why she chose to leave the United States.

Equal parts memoir, history, and current events, A Good Country presents a vital portrait of our nation, its people, and the pathway to a better future.

©2022 Sofia Ali-Khan (P)2022 Random House Audio

Excellent, poignant memoir with history

The author does an excellent job weaving her personal story with the history of each of the places in America she has lived. I feel richer for having read/listened to it.

Wonderful book

I loved it. Honest, well researched and intelligent. The information was personal but sweeping. It perceptively highlights so many issues central to immigration and social justice. I listened to the audio version which was performed well.

Better than any history lesson I have had.

Sophia tells her personal story while giving an important history lesson. Highly recommended. You will not be disappointed by this book.

Required Reading

Written in searing prose, Sofia Ali-Khan has provided what is destined to become the standard reference for the Muslim American experience in America. Detailing her own experiences growing up in the US and those of her family members, she powerfully describes the plight of a community, besieged by anti-Muslim hatred, prejudice and even violence. This is a side of the American dream few have dared recount and one that deserves careful reading by all those concerned about racism and exclusion in this country.

The narrator Kelsey Jaffer provides a sensitive and moving interpretation of the work.

A beautiful story with hard truths

Sofía writes her own story as well as the history we may not have learned in school. The way she weaves the two together allows the book not only to be informative of our country’s history but also compelling in the very honest story of her own lived experiences.
I find myself with a deeper understanding of where we find ourselves today. Im realizing how important it is for us to recognize the hurts and injustices of our nation’s past in order for us to create a better present and future for our children.