Samira Ahmed’s ‘Mad, Bad & Dangerous to Know’ is one of the loveliest YA romances I have read this year. Because it’s actually so much more than that. The book is so rich.

‘Mad, Bad & Dangerous to Know’ incorporates the elements of romance, mystery and historical fiction. Set Paris during the summer months, the main storyline follows Khayyam, a young girl from Chicago, whose roots surpass that of US. She is American, and French, and Indian, and Muslim, and her identity is clearly defined by all of those countries, cultures and religions. ‘Mad, Bad and Dangerous to Know’ follows Khayyam as she tries to uncover the two-century-old mystery, while also exploring her identity and figuring out what she wants and who she really is.

Khayyam is spending the summer in Paris, with her academics-parents, worrying about the unresolved mess she has left back in Chicago. Brooding over the boy she has left at home and still being upset over failed art history essay that was meant to guarantee her place at college, she doesn’t expect this summer to change her life. But then she meets a Parisian, a descendant of famous Alexandre Dumas, and together they set off to uncover a forgotten story of Leila, a Muslim woman whose path intertwined with Dumas, Delacroix and Byron.

We see the glimpse of Leila’s story both through Khayyam and Alexandre’s discoveries and the short chapters incorporating the narration from Leila’s perspective, seeing her story in the 19th century. In the beginning, I wasn’t completely sure whether I liked this interchanging narration, preferring to uncover Leila’s story with both young historians in making, but I grew to enjoy it. Through that, we witness Leila’s story almost as it has been happening now, giving it a sense of immediacy as well as underlying the importance of it, because we know that Leila has been forgotten in the history.

‘Mad, Bad and Dangerous to Know’ had a lot of elements of classic YA summer romance, with feelings developing between Khayyam and Alexandre, and the complications that have arisen as a result of their private lives. But while those parts have been unavoidably obvious, they added to the story.

I really have enjoyed this book, and I’m looking forward to more works by Samira Ahmed. She has a great voice and style, and I will definitely read more of her books.

A well written and fascinating story that kept me hooked.
Excellent storytelling and character development, a vivid background and a solid plot that kept me hooked.
Recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine.

Dancing between different times and different places, this beautiful book is engaging from the very start. You find yourself with more and more questions as the worlds entwine, and the realistic descriptions keep you on your toes. It's a read that is easy to fall in love with and be drawn in to, wanting to solve the many mysteries as well as know more about everyone you interact. A really enjoyable read, full of both fiction and fact combining on a background of good research to create a book to really lose yourself in.

This was a historical mystery unlike any other I’ve read, deftly weaving the past and present in a celebration of art, history and rewriting the narrative.

Ahmed weaves two compelling tales together through distinctive and striking protagonists. Both women are determined and driven indictable, underestimated because of their gender and race. Their voice are so compelling, leaping off the page and drawing you into their respective stories. I found myself falling in love with each of their vivacious personalities and willing them to succeed.

As a bit of a history nerd myself, I loved how Ahmed shows the magic of chasing down a historical mystery. There is so much to be uncovered from the past that we think we know and uncovering new details can be a painstaking but ultimately rewarding process. I particularly loved Ahmed’s discussion around historical erasure, privilege and race. It’s well known that history is written by the victors and this has often lead to the erasure of marginalised groups, silencing them and banishing them forever into the shadows. Ahmed ensures that this is no longer the case here, bringing stories into the light. This was so challenging and thought-provoking, inspiring me to research similar examples. Ahmed excels in exploring the intersection of racism and sexism, challenging both the role of women and people of colour in the historical narrative.

I will hold my hands up and admit that I may not know much about art, but I really wanted to learn more after finishing this book. You get swept up in the character’s wonderment at these marvellous creations. Ahmed utilises her word-weaving skills to create such vivid images of these works. I loved the writing style, as it felt so lyrical and poetic at times, while always keeping an edge of realism and I loved the feminist message that shone through.

Mad, Bad & Dangerous To Know is a powerful reclamation of our history and forming our own place in the narrative.

This book was absolutely brilliant!
It was fast paced, fun, captivating and FULL of feminism which I adored.

It tells the story of Khayyam, a young American/ French/ Indian Muslim who has a fascination with Art History and dreams of finding a lost Delacroix painting that she believes was gifted to Alexandre Dumas (the author of The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers). She goes to Paris, France for her yearly summer trip with her parents, and here meets Alexandre Dumas... the great grandson of the great author himself. The two of them embark on an adventure to discover this lost painting, and on the way uncover an unknown story of Leila, the lady with the raven hair.

Alongside Khayyam's storyline runs Leila's, from the early 1800s to the mid 1800s. Leila's story starts with her living as part of a Harem for Pasha, a cruel King, but she is in love with another man, her Giaour. Leila's story is the basis for the Byron poem, the Giaour, but the reality of her life differs to Byron's account. As Khayyam and Alexandre uncover more of Leila's past in the 21st century, we see glimpses of her life in the 19th Century.

I really enjoyed this book. It was so well crafted and such a fun read. I loved how feminist and strong Khayyam was, and how she felt an affinity with Leila and was determined to find a way to tell her story, and to break way from "his-story". Both of the female characters were great and we saw them struggle to determine their relationships with the male characters. There were some usual YA tropes, such as a love triangle etc, but this was all handled well and I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the romance plot, particularly as I felt it didn't take away the focus from the women and the quest to discover the lost story of Leila - this was the main plot and we saw Khayyam's determination to stay focused on this.

Alongside this plot of literary history, art history and hidden mysteries, we saw the day to day life of a teen who is struggling to know her identity and her place in the world. In the opening of this novel Khayyam states: "I am not a passport that everyone gets to stamp with a label of their choosing. Others look at me and try to shove me into their own narrative to define who and what I am. But I am not a blank page that everyone else gets to write on".
From this opening, I knew that I would love this book and its look at history, along with the identities of women and how they fit into different categories and have the right to craft their own story and narrative. This theme continued throughout the book and it was one of my favourite parts of it.

I really enjoyed this and will definitely be reading more by this author! I highly recommend that you check this out!

A very well written look at a story left untold during a fascinating period of art and literature, bringing to the forefront those whose stories have up 'til now been neglected.

I wanted to love this, because I love Samira Ahmed, but it was only okay. I didn’t care for the love triangle and I felt there were too many times where the author wanted to make sure we understood the moral of the story: to let women tell their own stories. The mystery was interesting and it had great potential, but it ended up falling flat for me.

disclaimer: I received this free from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

rep: biracial Muslim m/c

'I have my own voice. I have my own story. I have my own name. It's Khayyam'.


Mad, Bad & Dangerous to Know follows Khayyam, who is spending the summer in Paris. Devastated by a rejection of her essay to get into Chicago School of Art Institute, Khayyam is determined to try again – to prove her theory that Alexandre Dumas was gifted a painting by Eugène Delacroix. While investigating, she meets one of Dumas’ descendants and is determined more than ever to uncover what she believes to be a piece of missing history. Soon, she comes across the mention of a woman named Leila and becomes determined to uncover her story – the story of a woman who was just a name in others lives.

I am positive that Mad, Bad & Dangerous to Know will be a hit for those who enjoy reading about art and art history. It delves into the works of Alexandre Dumas, Eugène Delacroix, and Lord Byron – hence the title. I don’t know a lot about poets or artists, and obviously a lot of it was fictionalized, but it was an element I enjoyed. There are two alternative timelines happening in Mad, Bad & Dangerous to Know, one follows our amateur art historian Khayyam uncovering secrets and histories, and the other follows a woman named Leila – a woman who lived two hundred years ago in the Ottoman empire. I really enjoyed these interwoven stories.

Our protagonist Khayyam is great – she’s inquisitive and persistent but also reckless and romantic. She’s passionate and protective about Leila and her story. I also really loved her exploration of her identity:
“I live in between spaces. The borders between nations, the invisible hypen between words, the wide chasm between “one of us” and me alone.
French American.
Indian American.
Muslim American.
Biracial.
Interfaith.
Child of immigrants.


I really enjoyed the French setting – it was vivid and atmospheric, and also romantic. Her romance with Alexandre Dumas, a descendant of the Alexandre Dumas was *adorable*.

Mad, Bad & Dangerous to Know is a book about stories and about histories. It is about how we all have stories to tell and it’s about who remembers us and about who doesn’t. It’s about how we are all connected, in the end. It looks into women and how their histories and their stories tend to be forgotten, how history, especially women’s history, is rewritten predominantly by men. It is a story about truth, having agency, and being heard.

The reason I am only giving this 3 stars is that the middle of the novel was a little slow and less enticing than the beginning and the end so it struggled to hold my attention for a little while. Ultimately, though, Mad, Bad & Dangerous to know is a fun novel about stories, history, art, and has a little treasure hunt.

This story follows muslim-french-american teen Khayyam as she spends summer in Paris hot off the damning response to an art history essay she wrote about author Alexandre Dumas and artist Delacroix and a connection between them.

She meets a young french man, also named Alexandre Dumas, and together they try to find out more about Dumas and Delacroix' connections and history and how they are connected to a mysterious woman with raven tresses: Leila. Some badass feminist pride, some heartbreak, some JUST TALK TO EACH OTHER, and some breaking and entering later Khayyam and Alexandre break the art history world - a story you want to be true.

Leila's story is interwoven with Khayyam and Alexandre's and it is beautiful and devastating. Her love for her Giaour was consuming but her grace in facing the new facts of her life was inspiring.

I concede that this book has made me want to go read some poems by Byron and look at some paintings by Delacroix. But it is also a testament to the fact that we need more stories by women, about women, and especially women of colour. The Leilas of the world who never had a chance to speak in their own time, and the Samira Ahmeds of the world who need to be lifted up so that their stories can touch the hearts of women everywhere.

"For too long women's contributions have been disregarded. Forgotten. Barely footnotes in the stories and histories of men with power."

Thank you to NetGalley for an early copy of this book for review. I mean, that cover is beautiful, I just couldn't resist.

The start of this book started out on really solid ground. I appreciated how quickly I was seeming to get through it, and Khayyam was immediately introduced as an interesting character. She both lives on the border of every identity and none, constantly being asked who she is, where she's from... Her life has also just ended because the groundbreaking essay she was hoping to write turned out to be, well, not so groundbreaking after all.
Then you get a meet-cute. Or a meet-crap more realistically as Khayyam meets a super cute French guy, who also happens to be related to Alexandre Dumas.
Thanks to this meet-cute, Khayyam's life quickly delves into a (Scooby Doo) mystery to potentially find a lost painting or, at the very least, find more about the mysterious women from artwork of the time. With the addition of the historical timeline, I enjoyed watching the mystery play out, waiting to see how and if the two timelines would match up. Every time they found a new clue, I couldn't wait to see where it would go. It also made me really want to scour Google to see if any of it was actually real.
I loved how enthusiastic Khayyam was about Leila and bringing her back from the past, allowing her the chance to tell her story. It felt very telling and very realistic - I want that to happen all the time, women from history should always be given a voice! Historically, women have been pushed to the side, to the footnotes, to a dusty, locked cupboard; they've had to give up their story so men can tell theirs.
However, I kind of felt that was a little what happened here. Now, I don't think Leila's story here is used to tell anyone else's but it is certainly used to save other people's (a fact that Khayyam *is* aware of constantly). Leila's story more seems an addition to Khayyam's, rather than her own. I wish we'd got to spend more time in the past rather than a page here and there because I feel like I never got the chance to learn her story. We don't get to spend as much time in a world that could have been rich and beautiful, rather than distant and unseen.
I don't think this was helped by the fact that most of the book revolved around Khayyam's romances. Both love interests annoyed me and didn't really have much going for them, so I just wasn't rooting for them. I also think that making the romances messy didn't help. Had they just happened, it would be fine, but the fact that half the book is spent brooding about past and present relationships and, ironically, the impact that men have on her life, means that time was taken away from the story I was interested in.
It did also annoy me that there were maybe five women in this book: Khayyam, Khayyam's mum, Khayyam's friend, Leila and the woman who judged Khayyam's essay. Obviously Khayyam had a big part, but her mum was just there to reassure her about her romances, Khayyam's friend was conveniently absent (on a no-internet summer holiday), Leila we have discussed, and the judge was almost villainous for not liking the essay. So yeah. A story about giving a women a voice kind of missed the mark.

This review feels kind of harsh and I don't want the book to be perceived as bad, it just let me down on a few fronts that I felt really strongly about. Generally, it was still a really good book.

This book had some potential in the premise and story but it failed to deliver in any big way due to the odious main character and the main plot being railroaded by a romantic relationship that I found difficult to root for. It took me a long time to read it because it didn't pull me in at all.

I was immediately not fond of Khayyam. Her essay was based on one line of text she found in the internet - of course she was going to be torn apart by the judges of the essay competition for her poor research. She acted like it was some big, unfair conspiracy, like the judges had a vendetta against her. And she was constantly whining her ass off and using flowery language and throwing French in with no translation. Pining after some boy back home who was clearly not interested in her beyond a physical relationship.

I'm gonna have immediate dislike for the sort of protagonist that would describe anything like so:
"It's a trapezoid of stone and steel with marble mosaic floors, immense columns, and a sky-grazing rotunda where I can roam the exhibition halls content in anonymous humidity controlled solitude - as my barest self, Khayyam, unadorned and unfettered."

Khayyam was kinda gullible, too, considering her holier-than-thou attitude. She just believed this guy was who he said he was. It wasn't a plot point but it should have been. He saw a blatant American and chose her as a target and was just saying whatever she wants to hear about Dumas because he knew she'll do literally anything if she thought it was to do with Dumas. She'd go anywhere he wanted her to go. He could have been anyone. Of course, he actually was some legit descendant of Dumas, but my point stands.

It's an unsubtle preachy book that fancies itself as an educator. Khayyam frequently has inexplicable brain tangents about Paris architecture or how badly women have been treated by history and you're left just seeing the raw research that the author put into the book. Which unsurprisingly causes it to be dull. At a quarter of the way in to the book nothing had happened except that she'd expounded on her misery over her failed essay on Dumas and then found a handsome direct relative of Dumas who's taken her on a boring trek through letters to find out some dull long forgotten lineage of possession for a painting.

Khayyam is just so self indulgent all the time. Mooning over two boys whilst pretending she's really interested in telling the story of an unknown woman and patting herself on the back for it. I really don't know why this book needed a paltry attempt at a love triangle.

Leila's story, told in snippets at the end of each Khayyam chapter, was more interesting to start with but when three snippets in a row described the feeling of drowning, I grew tired of her too.

I was left unsure how much was fiction at the end of the book, which is a feeling I hate. Are all those pieces of media from painting to poem to novel, really actually all about the same forgotten Muslim woman? Or was the author just tying them together for the sake of her story? I'm assuming the stuff about Dumas being the grandchild of a slave was correct, and a serial womaniser and a lavish spender, but who knows what was made up for plot and what's real?

Mad, Bad & Dangerous to Know is a captivating story of two strong willed women, the first one is Khayyam, a French-Indian-Muslim American and a aspiring art historian and the second one is Leila, a 19th century woman, who was the favorite concubine of the king (Pasha) and whose path seems to mysteriously intersect with three great artists of all time- Byron, Delacroix and Alexandre Dumas.

The story unfolds in a very interesting manner, where the POV alternate between the two women. Leila's narration are comparatively shorter so as to maintain the mystery about her in the reader's mind until the reader uncovers the mystery along with Khayyam. Character building was really nice too. In fact, the introduction for Khayyam was just wonderful and so powerful as it goes like this:

Others look at me and try to shove me into their own narrative to define who and what I am. But I’m not a blank page that everyone else gets to write on.

I have my own voice.

I have my own story.

I have my own name. It’s Khayyam.

What made me give this book 3.5/5 was the fact that I am not a fan of love triangles (my fault) and I felt that there is just too much boy-drama (love-drama to be precise). Also, to be honest some parts felt a bit boring and some parts felt really sophisticated that it took a while to understand.

But still, I totally recommend this book. It is completely relevant to today's problem (#alllivesmatter and #ownvoice). It makes us realize that women and their voices are often overlooked and forgotten, making it an inspiring feminist read. Also, you could visit Paris even during this lockdown situation by just reading this book! Looking for books with love, betrayals, drama, mystery, adventure??? Well, all of these are there in this book.

I thank NetGalley and Orbit Books for giving me this wonderful opportunity. All opnions are my own.

P.s.- I love the cover!!!

I love Samira Ahmed, she had opened up doors to me in YA literature that I didn't know about and she has managed to educate me with her books and open my eyes to society as a whole. This book was a bit different to her others but I still loved it and I will continue to read on with this author's work.

Despite of what people might think this is a book about two women who find their voices and their way to tell their story by themselves, whithout any male intervention. Two women connected through the ages trying to find where they belong. There's a romance but I don't think is that important for the main plot.

The representation is on point, Khayyam - the protagonist- is French American, Indian American, Muslim American, Biracial, Interfaith and Child of immigrants. It is everything I ever wanted to read! I I've never read anything by Alexandre Dumas - the person who is behind all the plot of the book -but now I want to do it. Thanks Samira Ahmed for this amazing book. I really like the writing style and I'm looking foward to read more books from this author.

A feminist voice exploring identity and equality in two contrasting timelines , a skillful reimagining of Byron’s The Corsair , Samira Ahmed reminds us of just how eloquently she writes. Completely convincing historical scenes deftly entwine with the confliction of current identity issues. Once again, Ahmed’s tone is pitch perfect and wrapped in an absorbing, emotionally engaging story of peril and passion. Excellent!

I’m not a history buff as such, even though I love to live in my own nostalgia, but I can imagine how precious this book would be for art and history aficionados. The story is a simple yet interesting one – a summer fling, a treasure hunt, lots of famous poets, two heroines connected over centuries and a story that needs to be discovered.

Our present day heroine is Khayyam – a Muslim, American, French teenager spending a summer vacation with her doting parents in Paris and trying to figure out her love life as well as her future. Our heroine from the past is Leila, a concubine to the emperor Pasha and probably the inspiration behind Lord Byron’s Giaour poems. I felt like the whole book was Leila and Khayyam’s stories, with all the other men – present and past, being present as supporting characters in this narrative. I actually enjoyed that perspective a lot.

I have very little knowledge of poems or familiar with the works of famous poets, so I actually had to Google a lot of stuff to figure out which parts were real and which were fiction. That’s why, the treasure hunt parts were confusing for me, and probably the least interesting parts because I just couldn’t catch all the literary references (my bad). For me, the most interesting parts in the book were reading Leila’s narrative, and the author’s introspective moments in the book, via Khayyam’s thoughts. I love the way Samira Ahmed writes – there is a certain poetic and melancholic element to her writing style, that tugged at my heart strings.

If you’re picking up this book for the romance, then its probably best not to, since really, I felt like both the male characters – Zaid and Alexandre, were just there to help Leila and Khayyam’s story move forward. I actually felt that Khayyam’s parents had more personality than both the male protagonists in the little story time that they shared :D

I loved all the picnic scenes during the treasure hunt that Khayyam and Alexandre experience. I want to go and visit all those libraries and literary places and all those cafes whenever I get a chance to visit Paris :D

I was a little confused with the few times that Dumas’s biracial background was mentioned in the story, especially by Alexandre when he is arguing with Khayyam regarding the rights of minorities, women and slaves in history. I felt like it might have helped to have more information regarding both Dumas’s background and his struggles as well as Leila’s struggle being a Muslim woman in that time in history. I was also a little taken aback with the mystical element of Si’La in the story, it felt out of place in the overall narrative, but I wished there was more of Si’La and Leila’s narrative considering I’m such a fantasy buff LOL

Overall, I felt this was a good book to pick up if you’re looking for a fictional book to read with relevant Muslim, female and South Asian representation along with a lot of art and historic references. Also, I felt this book was definitely more YA than I’m used to.

***Thank you Netgalley for providing me with an e-copy of this book in exchange of an honest review***

Mad, Bad and Dangerous to Know is the perfect summer read! It is thought-provoking and profound and overall, just a joy to experience. It has definitely become one of my favourites of the year. Its commentary on cultural identity, the erasure of female stories in history, cultural appropriate and fetishization of Asian ethnicities. It manages to handle all of these topics whilst still remaining accessible and engaging which is something that is so important in ensuring that a wider audience is exposed to these messages.
“In America we bulldoze our past, build the future on the rubble, and pretend that ghosts can’t haunt us. I wonder if sometimes we ignore their voices because we are scared of hearing ourselves in their echoes.”
Our story is split into two perspectives, each following Muslim women across two different centuries. We have Khayyam who is spending her summer in Paris, still reeling from an inconclusive breakup and the rejection from her dream school for art history. Unexpectedly she crosses paths with an ancestor of Dumas and suddenly is living in a mystery she has already tried and failed to uncover, yet with new leads the pair begin to unravel the turbulent history of not only some of the greatest artists in French history but also a woman who was at the centre of it all yet has been erased completely. Then we follow Leila a concubine in the Pasha’s court whose story might finally get revealed to the world.
“We see history through a tiny peephole and fool ourselves into believing it’s the big picture.”
The pacing and plot of this book was thoroughly engaging and kept me going throughout, it became steadily harder to put down each time I began reading. The use of the second perspective to show us Leila’s story rather than simply waiting the end to tell us it, was especially important as it showed her as a person and not just a character from the past. However this did mean that the sense of mystery that Khayyam and Alexandre experience isn’t felt by the reader, so if this is what you are looking for then know this going into it to hinder any disappointment you may feel.
“She means for her words to bury me, but she doesn’t know they planted a seed.”
I really enjoyed the Parisian setting that takes up most of the book, it seemed strangely intimate to see summer in Paris through a local’s eyes instead of the tourists that are constantly referenced throughout. Despite speaking no French myself - bar being able to count to ten or list farm animals -the use of the language throughout the book was enriching to the story and made the setting so much more real.
“I have more to fear from men than jinn, my lord.”
This leads onto one of the biggest strengths of this book, the realism. Not just in the setting but also in the far from perfect relationships (there is a love triangle… but dare I say done well.) As well as the characters and the problems they face.
“It is a simple life, but it is mine.”
The characters in this are done so well. They feel real and face the same troubles that people do in real life. They make mistakes, they misjudge things, they have complex motivations, but most of all they can be passionate for what they believe in. Even if to others it seems unnecessary or obsessive. In a world like todays this book is a constant reminder to keep fighting for what you believe in and doing so unapologetically.
“Broken-hearted, but not broken.”
The writing style is perfection and I have saved so many quotes that mean so much. For this reason it seems like the only appropriate rating would be a full 5 stars!
“In the end, we all become stories.”

Thanks to NetGalley for allowing me to read this prior to publication, and introducing me to a story that reeled me in slowly.
The title stems from a phrase used to describe the poet, Lord Byron. I wasn't sure how this phrase could possibly link to the story, but it eventually became clear.
Our narrator is Khayyam, a seventeen year old American student who is fascinated by Art History but who is smarting from her most recent essay being discredited. While on holiday in Paris with her parents, Khayyam meets Alexandre Dumas (yes, really) - a descendant of the writer. They get talking, and before we know it a strange kind of hunt for missing treasure begins.
Both are convinced that Dumas had links with the painter Delacroix, and think that the link has something to do with a mysterious raven-haired beauty mentioned in works by Dumas and Byron, and featuring in paintings by Delacroix. Alongside this story in the present - which, in itself, would have been intriguing - we have the story of Leila, a young woman in the 1800s who has been the favourite of the Pasha, but who cannot bear him children.
It takes a while for the links between the characters and their stories to become clear. The hunt itself took something of a backseat for me as I was captivated by the attitudes to women and how history has, often, overlooked so many stories simply because of the gender of the person telling the story.
This was definitely a story that appeals on a number of levels. Yes, there are some amazing coincidences in this hunt, but the exploration of identity and the passion coming through for the subject was evident.

In this profoundly rich and riveting tale of two young Muslim women from different centuries and continents, Samira Ahmed has beautifully weaved together two unforgettable narratives in a thought-provoking literary mystery set to uncover a voice that has been silenced throughout history.

Intricately rooted in 19th century art and literature, Mad, Bad and Dangerous to Know is a passionate and inspiring story of destiny, heritage and history, with a heartfelt devotion to the women whose stories have been erased from the pages of history.

A must read for fans of historical and literary fiction, Mad, Bad and Dangerous to Know will sweep you across time to hidden histories and unheard voices.

I thought Samira Ahmed's previous books were really good, but I had a really hard time getting into this one. So much so, that I didn't end up finishing the book. I think it was a matter of expectations: I expected the historical fiction aspect to be more present than it really was, and I felt disappointed that there wasn't more of it. But I also just didn't feel pulled into the story and I found myself bored. I made a good enough dent in the book that the plot should have been taking off, but it just didn't.