1. Which Pakistani author penned Midnight Doorways: Fables from Pakistan, a collection that blends speculative fiction with South Asian folklore?

a) Mohsin Hamid

b) Usman T. Malik

c) Kamila Shamsie

d) Mohammad Hanif

4. Bilal Tanweer’s The Scatter Here Is Too Great is set against which backdrop?

a) The 2005 Kashmir
earthquake

b) A bombing at a
Karachi train station

c) The assassination of
a former Prime Minister

d) The 2010 Pakistan
floods

3. Sanam Maher’s The Sensational Life and Death of Qandeel Baloch is best described as:

a) A fictionalised account of a celebrity’s life

b) A collection of short stories

c) An investigative biography

d) A romantic novel

2. In No Honour, what central issue does Awais Khan address through the story of a young woman in rural Pakistan?

a) Forced child labour

b) Climate change

c) Honour-based violence

d) Political corruption

5. Which contemporary Pakistani novel features a dystopian Karachi where the city’s water supply is controlled by criminal cartels?

a) The Runaways by
Fatima Bhutto

b) How It Happened by
Shazaf Fatima Haider

c) The Wandering Falcon
by Jamil Ahmad

d) The Miraculous True
History of Nomi Ali by
Uzma Aslam Khan

Answers

1. The correct answer is b.

Usman T. Malik’s Midnight Doorways: Fables from Pakistan is a compilation of seven speculative short stories mixing the genres of horror, fantasy, science fiction, and magical realism. This collection is embedded in Pakistani culture and history, recontextualising local myths and legends, and everyday societal anxieties.

It does so through a genre that has seldom been explored by Pakistani writers in such depth.

From the colonial graveyards of Lahore to haunted hospitals and dystopian futures, Malik’s writing digs deep into the emotional and psychological landscape of a nation. It portrays a culturally rich country grappling with its past and present.

The stories are accompanied by impressive illustrations from six Pakistani artists. This collaboration makes Midnight Doorways a fitting literary and artistic homage to speculative storytelling in the region.

2. The correct answer is c.

Awais Khan’s No Honour is a thought-provoking character-driven story that focuses on honour-based violence affecting the lives of many people in Pakistan. It is set in the rural village of Faizpur, where the narrative follows the life of Abida, a sixteen-year-old bright and lively young woman. Abida has dreams that lies beyond the old traditions of patriarchy. Her desire for freedom and love leads to scandal in the conservative village.

Abida soon finds herself the victim of a covert honour-killing plot orchestrated by her family. Khan’s handling of this subject shows no overt bias. His in-depth study challenges the reader to examine how customs, misconceptions of poverty, and misinterpretations of faith trap victims and perpetrators in a vicious cycle of silence and violence.

Abida’s brave act of fleeing to the city and dealing with sex-trafficking rings shows her resilience. Her decision to optimistically rebuild her life illustrates countless unheard real-life stories.

3. The correct answer is c.

Sanam Maher’s The Sensational Life and Death of Qandeel Baloch is a gripping work of investigative non-fiction. It unpacks the complex life, controversial fame, and brutal murder of Qandeel Baloch—a young woman who defied social norms and paid the highest price in a society like Pakistan’s. Often called “Pakistan’s Kim Kardashian,” Baloch was a self-made social media star. She challenged patriarchal norms by owning her sexuality, expressing bold views, and provoking people in a society where women’s visibility is heavily policed.

The book speaks of class mobility and rural–urban divides, gender politics, and honour culture. It does so through an exhaustive field study and in depth interviews with Baloch’s family, friends, critics, and journalists.

4. The correct answer is b.

Bilal Tanweer’s debut novel The Scatter Here Is Too Great unfolds shortly after a terrorist bomb blast occurs in a train station in Karachi. Tanweer uses the bomb blast as an event for the reader to witness. Meanwhile, it charts a separate, interconnected web of lives. The narrative follows a grieving son, a young man in love, a newspaper photographer, a car thief, and the narrator. As things fall apart, the narrator is both witness and participant.

Each chapter is an experience with its own voice, style, and perspective. They reflect the disjointed and fragmented nature of a city in a state of flux, its reality entirely arbitrary.

This novel encapsulates the disorientation and violence of urban life situated in Pakistan’s most populous city. It also reveals the beauty of transience embodied in moments of connection and memory.

5. The correct answer is d.

Uzma Aslam Khan’s The Miraculous True History of Nomi Ali is a daring and creative novel that embraces a range of time-frames and genres. It combines historical fiction with speculative dystopia to offer readers a different version of Karachi’s chaotic present and its potentially frantic future.

The main character is Nomi Ali, a boy born on a small island off the coast of Karachi at the end of the nineteenth century. His story unfolds through multiple decades and locations.

Within the much larger context of climate change, along with the social and political instability of Karachi, the novel dramatises a future in which the city is hit hard by the realities of environmental catastrophe. The reader comes to understand Karachi’s struggle to access limited water resources, where a savage criminal cartel rules with violence and corruption.

This understanding is developed through the exploration of crushing inequality and apathy over many decades, alongside the ability of ordinary people to regenerate hope in spite of despair.