Claire Nicholls

What did you understand about your past and about your culture and your heritage growing up?

And so for you growing up, Patmina, you know, culturally, did you consider yourself Afghan, American or a little bit of both?

And could that be a source of tension between migrant children and their parents?

And what about for girls?

Are the expectations on girls different than the expectations on boys?

So I understand this novel, Good People, it started with a news story.

Tell me about this story.

So what did you notice when you were looking at media coverage of an honor crime, say, in America?

Right.

What were you noticing about the way that story was told?

I guess there would be people who would say, well, there's not a lot of nuance needed if, you know, somebody's killed their daughter.

Like, what do you say to that?

And that's, of course, where novels come in, right?

This gives us space to actually, you know, look beyond the black and the white.

So the book is called Good People.

It's set in Northern Virginia.

And our central family is this refugee family that really pulls itself out of poverty to achieve the so-called American dream.

Tell me about this family.

I'm thinking about what it must be like to have this sudden wealth.

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