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1. What major decision does Amal, the protagonist of the novel, make at the beginning of the narrative?

Amal is working out on her family's treadmill while watching an episode of the television show Friends, when she suddenly has an epiphany. Rachel's courage to leap onstage at ex-boyfriend's wedding and sing "Copacabana" in an ugly bridesmaids' gown inspires Amal to decide to wear "hijab, the head-scarf, full time" (1). Amal explains to the reader that she felt a jolt of courage go through her in this moment. She explains that this had occurred at 4:30 the previous afternoon and that now it is 3:20 in the morning. She is lying awake, watching television while she agonizes over whether she has "the guts do it" (2).

2. What distinction does Amal make between the two groups of women she and her Muslim friends call "part-timers" and those they refer to as "full-timers" (2)?

Amal states that she and her other Muslim friends use the term "full-timers" to refer to "girls who wear the hijab all the time, which basically means wearing it whenever you're in the presence of males who aren't immediate family" (2). She goes on to explain that young women such as herself are called "part-timers" (2). Amal says, "'Part-timers' like me wear the hijab as part of our uniform at an Islamic school or when we go to the mosque or maybe even when we're having a bad hair day" (2).

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