The Muslim in my Head by SAMAR MOHAN

Lyle Cline, an American academic researching Islamic radicals, starts interviewing Tahir Hussain, a recently acquitted Muslim terror suspect. Lyle is startled to learn that Tahir was a staunch atheist before his detention by the FBI. Tahir recounts the scornful contemporary attitudes towards Muslims that have trailed him from a dusty Indian village, by way of liberal universities in Kolkata and Boulder, Colorado to an engineering job in Denver. Lyle learns about the debilitating losses strewn across Tahir’s youth and adulthood, including his brush with a lynch mob, crucibles for his cynicism, rage and the complete annihilation of his faith. It is in prison that Tahir is introduced to Rumi’s poems, a gift from a friendly guard and a precursor to several transcendental visions.
What events made Tahir a disillusioned man? Did he plan to commit acts of terrorism? What were the ethereal visions he witnessed in captivity? Is God real?