Rasha
Young woman who moved to American from Syrian with her family while still a child. She is attending high school during the attacks of September 11, 2001 and just a few short months later finds herself in jail on ambiguous suspicions of potentially having connections to terrorist conspiracies.
Sami
The only Christian whom the author includes among cast of characters, Sami was also born in America. He enlists in the Marines ahead of the 9/11 attacks and proceeds to survive two tours of duty in Iraq. However, the pervasive racist directed against anyone considered to be of any sort of Middle Eastern heritage convinces him not to make himself eligible for a return trip. He also comes to see that the invasion of Iraq was a comprehensive mistake doomed to failure.
Yasmin
Brooklyn high school student Yasmin is moved to political activism on a grassroots levels when she takes on her the school administration in a debate over their impact within the structural outline of the student government. The school requires that student government representatives attend extracurricular school functions, but as a practicing Muslim she is prevents on grounds of faith from attending school dances. Several years later she is elected student body president after courtroom pressure finally convinces the school to alter its policy.
Lina
Lina is an Iraqi American whose family moves from a predominantly African American neighborhood into an upper middle class white neighborhood following an improvement in circumstances for her father. Moving on up does not prove to be great news for Lina, however, as she is soon an outsider at school leading a secret life her parents know nothing about. When they do find out, she is shipped back to Iraq—on two different occasions—in an attempt to de-Americanize her. After meeting a stranger online who turns out to have been a double spy working for both the FBI and Saddam Hussein, she enlists in the military.
Wisam
Wisam is an Iraqi man whom Lina meets online with whom she eventually falls in love. The circumstances of their relationship is such that it has remained platonic through the two years before Lina answers a knock on her door. It is the FBI that informs her that Wisam has not only been working for them, but is also spying for Hussein. He will sit in prison for two years before finally being deported.
