Kareem Between by Shifa Saltagi Safadi won the 2024 National Book Award for Young People’s Literature.

Safadi, a middle school language arts teacher, thanked her parents as she accepted the award during the ceremony in New York City on Wednesday night.

“They came from Syria to give us a better life,” said Safadi, who immigrated to America as a young girl. “It was a struggle with a new culture and language, and they showed us what it looked like to be strong, proud Muslims. I wouldn't be who I am without my parents.”

And the award-winning novel in verse wouldn’t have existed without the Muslim writers who came before her, she said.

“Thank you to the Muslim authors who stepped forward first and paved the way for me to be inspired to follow my dream of writing,” she said. “I would not have had the bravery of writing my first words if I had not seen Muslim books on the shelf. I would never have believed I could do it if I had not read the words of people before me who showed me what it looks like. So often I saw books where Muslims were the villains, and I'm glad I finally got to write a story where we’re the heroes.”

Kareem Between is the coming-of-age story of a Syrian American boy balancing school, family, and football. It is about identity and standing up for what is right and a particular moment in America’s recent past. Set in 2016, his mom returns to Syria to care for her ailing mother but is not allowed back into the United States because of President Donald Trump’s Muslim ban.

“Kareem Between started out as a historical fiction, a story about justice, about standing up against racism, about being proud of who you are, a story about something that happened eight years ago,” she said. “But it's not historical fiction anymore, and it does not apply to only that time or only the Muslim ban. And our work did not stop in 2020. In fact, dehumanization of Arabs and Islamophobia has been rising more than ever in this past year to justify a genocide of the Palestinian people.

"Justice and freedom [are] for all people. All of our liberations are tied together—from people in Gaza, in Sudan, in Congo, in Syria, and every corner of the world to people here in America and deep within our hearts. Change starts with each of us. We have to stand together, protest injustice no matter where it is, and continue to speak the truth even when we're afraid of the future.”

Author Mike Jung, a member of the Young People’s Literature judging committee, congratulated Safadi on Bluesky.

“Congratulations to Shifa Saltagi Safadi on winning the National Book Award in Young People’s Literature and delivering the speech we wanted and needed to hear!”

Kareem Between was selected from a list of finalists that included Buffalo Dreamer by Violet Duncan, The Great Cool Ranch Dorito in the Sky by Josh Galarzas, The First State of Being by Erin Entrada Kelly, and The Unboxing of a Black Girl by Angela Shanté.

Watch the full National Book Awards ceremony below.