Life After Ambition: A Good Enough Memoir

In this pert if slipshod debut, Canadian journalist Niazi unpacks the work ethic instilled in her by a Muslim immigrant childhood at the edge of poverty. Burdened by her parents’ unhappy marriage, Niazi was raised with the immigrant refrain that the “sacrifices of home and family should spur in us... raw desire to succeed and better ourselves.” Though she was pushed by her parents toward “the standard list of hoped-for occupations: doctor, lawyer, engineer,” a high school internship with a youth-focused newspaper convinced Niazi that journalism was her path. Throughout college and young adulthood, she was torn between writing for an alt weekly that “paid me in free food and beer” and taking jobs that could earn her a living. The promise of stability came with a producing job at the CBC in Toronto, but a violent attack by an ex-boyfriend sent her spiraling into drug addiction. She then became sober, married a coworker, and navigated infertility and pregnancy, all the while wondering if ambition was the biggest obstacle to her happiness. Niazi’s core ideas about hustle culture and the immigrant experience are plenty rich, but pedestrian prose and a pervading sense of solipsism prevent them from blossoming. It feels like a missed opportunity. Agent: Erin Malone, WME. (Jan.)