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On the day the Sharafs bury their 18-year-old daughter, the girl’s mother is so bereaved, she can barely stand. The father is so anguished, he nearly climbs into the grave himself. 

But as Patmeena Sabit’s debut novel unspools, it’s up to the reader to parse the truth about the girl’s death — and who may have been accomplices to it. The narrative is told through a kaleidoscope of viewpoints. Fellow Afghan immigrants, journalists and law enforcement each relate what they saw, through their  own lens. But eye witnesses can be wrong. Neighbors have an agenda. One person’s truth is another person’s lie. 

“When I was creating the story, I was thinking … about the nature of perception and how reliable that is, and objective truth and if there is an objective truth to any one situation,” she tells Kerri Miller. 

” is both a cultural study of a community’s judgement and an interrogation of what it means to be an American — all with a crime at the center of it. Sabit and Miller talk about it on this week’s Big Books and Bold Ideas.

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Looking for the next novel to stir things up at your book club and get everyone talking? Kerri Miller says “Good People” has it all — competing stories, competing cultures and a crime at the center of it all.

The book cover of "Good People" with an author photo of Patmeena Sabit.

In 'Good People,' the story depends on who's telling it

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