Mona

An Immodest Memoir of Race and Rebellion

By: Azra Liaqat Khan

As irreverent as it is insightful, MONA turns the repressed Muslim girl trope on its head as Azra, academic by day and stripper by night, navigates a double life and a political awakening.


Azra Liaqat Khan’s ordinary Muslim American childhood in Charlotte, North Carolina transforms after her family joins the strict Salafi sect and a new lifestyle is mandated: No more music, Bollywood films, or mixing between the sexes. Azra becomes a pro at evading her desi parents’ rules—hiding her boyfriend, her social life, and her assortment of sleeveless tops.

Right as she begins to find fun and freedom in college, post-9/11 Islamophobia snaps Azra out of her stupor, prompting her to investigate American empire and the country’s zeal for plunder. But when her parents decide it’s time for her to get married, and a parade of losers appears, Azra flees to New York City for graduate school and finds herself, for the first time, far from her family’s watchful eyes—and $80,000 in debt.

And so “Mona the Stripper” is born. On and off stage, Azra becomes immersed in the politics of sex work, the racial dynamics of the strip club, and in a new life away from her parent’s surveillance.

With a winning mixture of wry humor and laugh-out-loud hilarity, Azra meets an unforgettable cast of customers, dancers, and potential husbands who collide in her discordant reality. Whip-smart and wonderfully unique, Mona reveals how racism and patriarchy confront the unstoppable quest to become whole. A story of a life lived underground, and yet fully exposed, Mona is a testimony to the radical power of reinvention.