Additional information
by Shamaila Khan (Author), Reyhana Ismail (Illustrator)
What do you do when your daughter just wants to be pretty like the girls she sees on screens and magazines?
All the Ways to be Pretty aims to provide parents with a starting point for conversations about beauty from an Islamic perspective. All humans are beautiful in their own unique ways, and this book is not about diminishing that gift. It is a gentle reminder that beauty is also what lies on the inside; our character and our actions beautify us, so why be 'just pretty' when you could be 'pretty wise' like Khadijah RA, 'pretty smart' like Aisha RA, or 'pretty brave' like Sumayya RA!
Author Biography
Shamaila Khan is a family lawyer, she is married and a mother to a 7 year old daughter. She was inspired to write All the Ways to Be Pretty after noticing that society expected her daughter to be 'pretty', dressed in fancy frocks, have good hair, etc. in a way that isn't expected of boys. She also noticed her daughter absorbing those expectations despite her efforts to shield her from them. This is Shamaila's first book.
Reyhana is an illustrator, designer, and aspiring picture book author from Lancashire, UK. She worked as a magazine designer for over 10 years before venturing into the wonderful world of children's book design and illustration in 2016. Through her own love of reading since childhood, her career naturally gravitated towards book design, and she has been fortunate to have worked with a number of publishers and authors, both in the UK and internationally. Whilst she has designed a wide range of books, she finds children's picture books a wonderfully creative challenge and an absolute delight to work on, and hopes to publish her own picture books in the future, having written a handful of stories drawing on her upbringing, life experiences, and interests.
Reyhana particularly enjoys illustrating intricately detailed scenes, bursting with patterns, textures and an abundance of botanical elements, designed to enchant and fascinate younger audiences. Her passion and strength is in background design, and she finds that compelling backgrounds can set scenes and often tell stories in themselves.
When she's not working, Reyhana can be found reading historical fiction or retellings of Greek myths, baking beautiful cakes, or attempting to keep her garden in bloom...if not planning her next trip to her favourite Turkish village, where the backdrop of majestic mountains and turquoise seas fuel her creative inspiration.
