In the Land of Invisible Women is an inticing look at a sliver of Saudi Arabian life. When Dr. Qanta Ahmed, a British Muslim physician of Pakistani heritage who trained in the US, was unable to secure a visa to remain in New York, she signed up for a stint as an intensivist at the National Guard hospital in Riyadh. From the lounge waiting for her flight onwards, she begins to enter a very culturally different space which I wanted to explore with her.

However, the writing style didn't have enough of a narrative arc to fully achieve that effect. After the first few chapters describing her arrival, the rest were organized by topic, rather than chronologically. Several chapters and months into her stay came the first mention of her cat. A chunk in the middle describing Hajj (pilgrimage to Mecca) and a potential love interest lent some continuity. Although Dr. Ahmed uses descriptive language, some medical lingo slips through (mesomorphic to describe the love interest, hypertensive to describe a good friend) and most events were painted in an extreme, and thus melodramatic, light.

Nonetheless, I enjoyed reading about the professional elite 'glitterati' circles she moved in, and the reactions to 9/11 towards the end of her two years (1999-2001) in Riyadh. She definitely made—and shared with readers—some inroads in understanding a culture to which I would have very little direct exposure, and well as her own religion. A recommended read.