In her memoir, "The Last Sandstorm", Jasmin Faulk-Dickerson tells the story of her first 25 years in Saudi Arabia, before her daring escape to the West. The author was born in the 1970's and grew up in the shadow of Riyadh, a city that was burgeoning into economic modernity, a sharp contrast with its archaic treatment of women. This memoir is both a coming of age story and an immigrant's saga, two overlapping narratives that are told with generosity, humor, and a pervasive sense of longing and loss. The narrative documents what it means to grow up with unanswered questions, strive to conform and belong, and finally, dare to leave behind a family, a country, and a way of life–the known world. In turn, Faulk-Dickerson invites us to take measure of our own potential and to participate fully in our own lives.
While Jasmin experienced the privileges and privations of being female in a conservative Muslim regime, she survived and thrived by daring to imagine an entirely different kind of life. Jasmin shares the particulars of her daily life–school, Muslim customs, popular culture, family life, friends–that create a palpable sense of what it was like to be loved but also thwarted by circumstances. Out of sight of the censors, Jasmin became an aficionado of popular culture, drawing on music, dance, film, and TV icons from Europe and the United States. In the privacy of her bedroom/studio, she became an artist, performer, and feminist freedom fighter–a magnificent leap of faith that eventually translates into the courage to leave.