Farzana Doctor

Canadian author debuts with an unlikely romance

Comments (0) By Olivia Flores Alvarez Thursday, Aug 16 2007

Farzana Doctor’s Stealing Nasreen isn’t the typical debut novel, but then again, Doctor isn’t the typical debut novelist. Stealing Nasreen deals with an Indo-Canadian lesbian therapist who becomes involved with a supposedly straight couple, recent immigrants from Mumbai, India, in a doomed love triangle (try saying that five times fast). The author herself is — would you never guess — an Indo-Canadian lesbian therapist. Hey, where have we heard that before? Well, they say you should write about what you know, and it seems Doctor knows about love, loss and the struggle to fit in.

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She laughs at the obvious comparison between her lead character and herself. “I did want to write about some of the realities that I have definitely observed and the realities of the communities that I’m a part of,” she says. “But this is a work of fiction. Most of the time people link the character of Nasreen to me…and because it’s my first novel, I did want to have at least one character who was somewhat familiar. I’m hoping that people will pick it up as a fun summer read, even if they don’t share any of these identities.” Doctor has already crisscrossed the U.S. and Canada reading and signing her book. “It’s been really lovely. I’ve had really mixed crowds. I have had predominantly South Asian crowds, and also predominantly gay and lesbian/bi/trans crowds. It’s been really interesting to have that mix.”