Book review: Good Intentions – an intelligent and engaging novel that approaches racism in a nuanced and clear-sighted way

Birmingham author Kasim Ali examines the lives and confronts the fears and prejudices of Britain’s second-generation immigrants in a well-written debut

Kasim Ali has produced the charming realism of a David Nicholls novel with an ending that opens out into something inventive and unexpected

Good Intentions, the thought-provoking debut novel by Birmingham author Kasim Ali, initially appears to be a love story. Nur meets Yasmina at a university party. She’s smart, funny, easy to get along with. Like Nur, she is Muslim and a second-generation immigrant from the north of England. But unlike Nur, who is of Pakistani origin, Yasmina is Sudanese and Black.

And so, because Nur fears his family won’t consider her “a suitable girl”, their relationship ...