In Conversation with: Aliyah Umm Raiyaan – author of Ramadan Reflections
When you centre your dreams around Allah, it becomes a simple process, whereas when we take Allah out of the equation, it becomes complicated. Fear creeps in and impostor syndrome, and so on.
Hello and Salaam my friends,
Eid Mubarak to everyone celebrating! I hope you’re having a fabulous time celebrating. Eid is the entire week for me, even though I have a deadline coming up tomorrow 🥲
This month’s interview is featuring the stellar Aliyah Umm Raiyaan, author of Ramadan Reflections and recently published The Power of Du’a. The interview actually took place around this time last year (don’t ask why it’s taken this long to transcribe 🥲), and there are so many timeless gems in there so I decided to share it anyway. I hope you enjoy reading!
About Aliyah:
Aliyah Umm Raiyaan reverted to Islam in 1999 as a young woman and has been involved in UK dawah for over twenty years. In 2010, she founded Solace UK, a charity that helps women who have reverted to Islam and find themselves in difficulty. In 2019, she launched a YouTube show called Honest Tea Talk, which brought unscripted conversations to the table about raw unspoken topics related to the Muslim community. She continues to devote her time to helping women achieve their full potential whilst emphasising the importance of developing a personal and close relationship with Allah. She lives in East London with her family. She is the author of the Sunday Times bestseller, Ramadan Reflections.
Name: Aliyah Umm Raiyaan
Book title(s): Ramadan Reflections, The Power of Dua
Genre: Non-fiction
I’m so excited to be speaking with you as I’ve been following you for a while from Facebook. I enjoyed reading your inspirational and reflective posts, and I knew you were writer even though you hadn’t written a book yet. So, I’m quite curious – have you always wanted to be a writer? Did you ever want to write a book?
I’ve always written ever since I was a child, and one of my childhood dreams was actually to become a writer. Before I’d written Ramadan Reflections, it was written on my heart. Writing has been my way of getting through life circumstances, and it helped to make me a writer.
Your publishing journey is a bit different than the usual since you were approached by an editor. Did they have a book in mind, or did you come up with an idea?
They had a book in mind – they wanted it to be on reflections, with a journal element, and they wanted it to be connected to Ramadan. They left the rest up to me, so I had quite a bit of creative freedom. I didn’t have an idea in mind, but this book became a culmination of all I’d been through.
It’s so interesting you say that, because sometimes we go through so much, and it doesn’t make sense. Then one day, Allah ties it all together. And you realise why you had to have all those experiences.
Exactly. That’s definitely been the situation with this book.
If I’d been approached maybe a couple of years ago, I wouldn’t have been ready to write this book. All I’ve been through to date has contributed to the ability to write honestly and vulnerably.
How did it feel when an editor approached you? Were you nervous? Or were you like yeah, I'm gonna do this because I’ve got Allah or was it a mix of both?
I was shocked. I thought it was a scam. The message came through on Instagram, and especially because it was Penguin Random House, I thought it was a bit dodgy. But then I checked the email she sent me, and I realised it was real, that’s when I got very nervous. But I also knew that since I’d been making du’a about this, it must be willed by my Lord. It’s an opportunity from Him, and I trust that He will get me through.
What was your favourite part of the entire process?
I haven’t had a question like this in the interviews I’ve done, and this has taken me back to that moment. There were very few people who knew about it when it happened, I kept it quite private, for a number of reasons. So, what I enjoyed most was doing this in private, for the sake of my Lord. I wrote the book with only a handful of people knowing, and it was very beautiful, because I was simply writing from my heart.
I love that so much. I feel like those are one of the best acts to do because the only pressure you feel is from wanting to please Allah. It helps you keep your intentions right. I’m going to ask about your writing process now – what was your favourite part of the process?
I love planning, I love organising. So, I loved creating the book outline and developing the skeleton of the book. Prior to starting the plan, I took myself out to a park in East London, sat in front of a lake and said, ‘Ya Allah, this has come from you, so guide me and guide my path.
I don’t know what you want me to put in this, but I trust your guidance.’ Then I started brainstorming and making certain decisions, and I enjoyed that.
Did you have to change the outline during the writing or editing process?
So, when I created the outline of the chapters, they followed a particular pattern, and it pretty much stayed the same. There were one or two elements I didn’t end up including but the rest was fixed, particularly because I only had a month to write the first draft. I didn’t have much room to play around with it too much.
A month, wow. That leads nicely to my next question. What was the most difficult part of the writing process for you?
Definitely writing it in a month. It was really intense.
How did you make it work?
I had to shift things around. I either delegated work or shelved some things. My children, may Allah bless them, were incredibly patient.
I couldn’t write at home, so I had to write outside. I found that really, really difficult because there were so many things staring at me – the washing, cleaning, everything, and it was really hard. But I kept making du’a.
I almost gave up on a couple of occasions because I was so behind that I could see the deadline looming. But then I turned to Allah and begged him to help me, and it was my daughter, my eldest, who said, ‘Mum, you can do this. You’ve always told me I can do anything.’ It was so beautiful hearing from her what I’d been saying to her, it was just like a mirror. She was like go, go to the coffee shop, get to it.
Were you able to find a routine at any point during the process?
I didn’t have a routine. I couldn’t have a routine because of the demands of my life. So, it was literally finding pockets of time and writing. Let’s say I’ve had a day of work at Solace, then home-schooling my children, and I’ve got a two-hour window, I take myself out and write during that time. Sometimes I think maybe I’ll get one chapter done in that time, but then I'm faced with writer’s block, and that means I get behind on my schedule. It was really hard.
How did you tackle writer’s block? Or even the guilt that came with writer’s block?
There’s a chapter where I actually write about this. There was one instance when I had severe writer’s block, and I was exhausted. It was a chapter that I had to write in a very short space of time because of how delayed I was in my schedule, and I couldn’t find a story to start with for that particular chapter. I would start and delete, start and delete. And then SubhanAllah writer’s block became the story.
Look at how Allah works. Did you ask any of your writer friends for advice? Did you seek out writing advice online? Or did you just go with the flow?
I think I did right at the beginning. I looked at a website, then decided to just do me. To write with my own voice, with the help of Allah alone.
What was it like working with an editor?
So, initially I had a project editor, and I sent a couple of chapters to begin with and she sent me back her comments. They weren’t very long – she gave suggestions about word count for each part of the chapter, which was helpful. Once I had that, I continued writing, and I wrote the whole book without sending her anything, beyond questions here and there. Then I sent the whole draft over by the deadline Alhamdulillah.
She was the first one to read it cover to cover, and she went through and made her edits. I remember, she said, there would normally be a red pen everywhere, but she hardly had any edits for the book. She gave me room to be me. She said she enjoyed it, and it felt like having an intimate companion, which I found interesting since she’s not a Muslim. But you never know who it’s going to touch.
Then, it went to a copy editor. Again, his edits were very minimal. Then it went through to proofreads and over to production.
Allah made it a smooth process, Alhamdulillah. What was your biggest learning during the entire publishing process?
One of the greatest lessons I took was right at the beginning when I suffered from impostor syndrome. So right after I submitted the outline to the publisher, and they took it to the acquisition meeting, they said, we'd like to go to contract. So, I knew I had to start writing, but when the time came to write, I thought, ‘No, they’ve got it wrong. They’ve chosen the wrong person. I can’t do this. This is Penguin, I’m just a writer who shares my thoughts and feelings on social media, which people have resonated with, but I don’t think I can do this. I’m going to submit the first draft and they’ll realise they’ve made the wrong decision.’
Then, I spoke to a friend of mine who’s a published author, and she said, ‘You were a writer before this, you are still a writer. Go back to your reason why. Why do you want to do this?’ And I said, ‘I want the book to draw hearts back to Allah.’ She said, ‘Who are you doing this for?’ I said, ‘For the sake of my Lord.’ And she said, ‘Okay, we'll remove Penguin from the equation and focus on writing.’ It was such simple advice, but as soon as I did that, the words began to flow.
My greatest lesson is just focus on your why, and it becomes very simple.
I went on Umrah for the first time in January, and I remember saying to a friend, one of my favourite things about Umrah is that it’s such a stark reminder that at the end of the day, it’s just you and Allah. If a publisher says no or yes, as long as your intention is tied to Allah, He will facilitate a way.
When you centre your dreams around Allah, it becomes a simple process, whereas when we take Allah out of the equation, it becomes complicated. Fear creeps in and impostor syndrome, and so on. That was something profound for me.
What do you hope readers get out of your book?
I want them to leave this book with a renewed sense of love, fear and hope of Allah. I want them to leave this book having fallen in love with Allah and developed a very close relationship with Him, which will help them to navigate the rollercoaster of this. I want them to have their eyes fixed on the ultimate destination, which is Jannah in shaa Allah. I want them to find themselves and to find Allah in this book.
That’s so beautiful. I pray Allah makes this book a form of Sadaqatul Jariya for you.
My very selfish reason for writing the book is that I pray it allows for me to be forgiven for my own mistakes and sins, and I get some rewards in the process. An interesting thing is that my early readers group have said that, although the title says ‘Ramadan Reflections’ it’s certainly a book that can be read outside of Ramadan.
Would you see yourself writing another book because I'm patiently waiting for another book, but I also know that the publishing process is tiring?
The golden question. I've been asked this question so much in the last few weeks, and my answer is always the same. Right now, I’m looking forward to a little bit of downtime. I’m so tired. I need to look after myself, I need to spend time with my children, and I just want to take myself to a coffee shop and read a good book.
Although I was made this offer, I didn’t for looking for it. It came out of Allah’s kindness and generosity, so if He brought another opportunity my way and I believe it’s good, then why not? I do have another idea for a book, funny enough, but I’m not driven to begin writing straightaway.
Downtime is a useful part of the process too. Since you have an idea, I’m pretty sure your subconscious would be doing a lot of the work. So, my final question for you is, what are you looking forward to the most for Ramadan?
Prior to the publisher approaching, I was really looking forward to Ramadan being a very quiet one. But due to the book, that's not going to be the case lately, so I am looking forward to having quiet time with my lord. I need to be alone with Him and I’m very much looking forward to that. Even if it isn’t as much as I would have hoped, the moments I do have, I need to make them special.
Thank you so much for taking the time to have a conversation with me, what a blessed start to a Sunday!
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Till next Friday,
Suad x
This was such a beautiful and uplifting read. Thank you so much for sharing!