It speaks of the troubles of Muslims as they struggle to maintain a unique cultural identity while defending their ''Britishness'' and loyalty to the state against political and social activists who wish to alienate them.
In an interview with The Jakarta Post, she described her writing process: ''When I read the play—which has at its center two sisters who respond differently to the legal repercussions of their brother's act of treason—I knew immediately that I wanted to connect it to a story that was very much in the news at the time, that of young British Muslims and their relationship with the British state...When you write a novel you don't think about subjects as being sensitive or not—you just think of them as being interesting and complex, and you wonder how to tell them in a story that's about a group of characters.
Prolonged interrogation in security causes Isma to miss her flight from London to Boston, but she eventually makes her way to Amherst, Massachusetts where she settles into a routine, spending mornings in a cafe working and keeping an eye on Skype, where she sees both her younger siblings' names appear briefly each day.
She greets him without her hijab for the first time and tells him the story of her father, who was absent much of her life (and the entire lives of her young siblings), fighting as a jihadi in various conflicts.
They reconcile, partially, though Isma is wounded when he refers to his relationship to her as like a "brother" and she makes an excuse not to see him again before he ends his sojourn in the U.S. and returns to London.
Back in London, Eamonn treks to Isma's aunt's house in Preston Road in Wembley—the neighborhood where his own father's family had lived—to deliver the M&M's in person.
Moving back in time to just prior to Isma's departure, Parvaiz is working at a grocery and pursuing his interest in sound engineering; while a scholarship allows Aneeka to attend university, he cannot afford tuition.
He receives a panicked call from his sisters, who know he has missed his flight and are being interrogated by police in London, cementing Parvaiz's regret for his decision, but he is trapped.
Karamat Lone, who has ordered an investigation, publicly discloses that Parvaiz's sister, Aneeka, had seduced his own son in an (unsuccessful) attempt to win special consideration for her terrorist brother.
Additionally, as Karamat Lone's policies as Home Secretary had denaturalized Parvaiz, the UK refuses to repatriate his body and sends it to relatives in Pakistan instead.
Karamat's denunciations of the Pasha family draw praise in Parliament but Aneeka is outraged and travels to Pakistan to insist that her brother be returned to the UK for burial, setting up camp in a public park with his body.
Eamonn, who has been sent to a family friend's home in Normandy, returns to the public eye with the release of a video denouncing his father for preventing Aneeka from burying her brother in the UK.
In regards to Karamat Lone, Shamsie stated that initially she felt the concept of a Briton of Pakistani descent becoming a Conservative Party Home Affairs Minister as something not plausible, but reconsidered when she saw the rise of Sajid Javid, Sadiq Khan, and Sayeeda Warsi in British politics.
[9] Akin to a play's five acts,[10] the book is in five sections, each focusing on a different character's point of view,[11] told in free indirect discourse.
[13] Home Fire is a contemporary reimagining of the Greek tragedy Antigone[14] and New York Times book critic Dwight Garner argued the novel "hews to [the original's] themes: civil disobedience, fidelity and the law, especially as regards burial rights.
Home Fire pulls off a fine balancing act: it is a powerful exploration of the clash between society, family and faith in the modern world, while tipping its hat to the same dilemma in the ancient one.