How a Terrorist is Made

Review: “Terrorist”

Author: John Updike

Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf, 2006, 310 pgs.

As lives inched forward following the events of 9/11, Americans entered an uncharted territory marked by a surge of interest and huge suspicion in all things Muslim, by ever-changing terror alerts from the new Department of Homeland security, and by fears that the U.S. could be incubating disaffected youngsters susceptible to becoming terrorists—without these youth knowing they’re vulnerable until it’s too late.

Pulitzer prize-winning author John Updike’s latest novel, “Terrorist,” deftly picks up on these themes as he goes way beyond a “ripped from the headlines” treatment to create an intellectual thriller that dissects the thoughts of a young American Muslim as he becomes the willing puppet of a terrorist cell in the New York metro area.

Eighteen-year old Ahmad Ashmawy Mulloy is a disaffected young man. The son of a green-card seeking Egyptian immigrant who took off when Ahmad was three and a free-wheeling Irish-American mother who gives him intermittent attention, Ahmad is left adrift and in search of a grounding identity for himself. And so at the age of 11, Ahmed turns to his local mosque in New Prospect, N.J., trying to find some purpose to his life (and in as a futile attempt to connect with his father).

There he falls under the tutelage of Shaikh Rashid, a smart, smooth-talking Yemeni imam. Rashid begins to teach Ahmad about the Qur’an while slowly inculcating his extreme vision of an Islamic “Straight Path,” designed to protect the young man against a world awash in temptation and an American culture rife with of impurity and unsalvageable wickedness. The isolated and lonely Ahmad is the perfect sponge for this dangerous rhetoric, and Rashid sees a golden exploitive opportunity in his young student.

Under Rashid’s guidance, Ahmad forgoes college to obtain a trucking license and is steered toward becoming a driver for the Chehab family, which owns a furniture business. Ahmad forges a bond with the younger Chehab son, Charlie, a strange character whose dual passions for Americana and Islamic extremism are explained in the last pulsating chapter of the book. Ahmad is pushed along a path to becoming a shahid, or martyr, as the driver of a truck rigged with explosives ominously bound for the Lincoln Tunnel.

Updike’s paints vivid pictures that goes beyond black and white to identify each person’s color as a metaphor for his personality: Teresa, Ahmad’s mother, has freckled skin that is “unbelievably white, like a leper’s,” while his father’s color is “perfectly matte, like a cloth that’s been dipped.” Ahmad, as a result, is “dun,” a low-luster shade lighter than beige.” With his mixed-blood background, Ahmad sees his dun skin as receding into the background where only God will notice his virtues.

Ahmad is drawn to the browns. He is fascinated with classmate Joryleen Grant, a seductive girl whose “smooth body, darker than caramel but paler than chocolate” is a frustrating temptation for him. The “brown” family—in Ahmad’s eyes--seems to push past the filth and impurity to somehow become God’s children. From Ahmed’s viewpoint, white-oriented characters--the “infidels” of the world--are shameful and godless, which Updike cleverly plays upon when Ahmad unthinkingly notices that Rashid has a “waxy-white” complexion.

Only Ahmad’s high school counselor, Jack Levy, (who has a summer affair with Teresa), is absent of a colorful description, as he becomes the unlikely diversion (and hero) in Ahmad’s dangerous path when he intercepts the youth on his trip to the Lincoln Tunnel. Jack--a 63-year-old Jew worn down by his unappreciated ministrations to generations of high school youths and by a lackluster marriage to his increasingly overweight wife, Beth--is drawn to Ahmad’s reserved demeanor and alarmed by his constant quoting of the Qur’an and disdain for the whole of American life.

Continued on page 2: What are the warning signs to snuff out sparks of homegrown terrorism? »