It is now 2013, and no doubt many Pakistanis like our titular narrator have reason to be suspicious of America, perhaps over secret agreements and drone strikes. I will not deny that, nor claim they are unjustified. But this book is written and set much earlier, in the reign of Bush II, where bile flowed more freely and anti-Americanism was more open everywhere. 
 The Reluctant Fundamentalist is trying to be a political allegory yet also a complex psychological piece, yet it accomplishes neither. Most of the characters are flat and pallid stereotypes. See the unattainable cliche, the firm fit model 'Am-Erica', a blonde Madonna for the narrator to lust over, and her dead lingering boyfriend 'Chris-tian'. The narrator's own name might be too easy to pin as cliche. 'Changez', of course, resembles 'Changes' in English, but it is actually the name of the bloody 'Genghis' in Urdu - a strange name for a Pakistani. 
 The plot is only a string of circumstances, which our allegory is knotted on to. A young boy goes to Princeton and Wall Street, he is changed forever, he hates his new successful life and himself. Allows himself a smile on 9/11. So on and so on. 
 However, there is one element which impressed me, much so than all the rest combined. I'm not sure who else has reached this interpretation. It concerns the narrator, his own ugly little mind, and how he seeks to change the world to that image he creates. 
 What sort of person does it take to be a fundamentalist, or some other such extremist belief? An outsider, a pariah, someone who has never part of a cohesive nation to begin with. It is this pariah who dreams up an image of what a Real better life is really like, dreaming of rebelling or crushing all enemies, real or imagined. History and memory are a builder's putty to them, as they marry their delusions and abandon their ugly reality. See the poor Austrian peasant, Hitler-nee-Schicklgruber, who dreamed of a greater Germanic knightly glory. See the Georgian peasant, Stalin-nee-Dzhugashvilli, who harnessed socialism to a greater Russian nationalism for his dreams of mechanizing the Soviet people. And so on. See the mentally deformed persons who slouch into White Pride meetings today in America for further examples. 
 There are, of course, those who join terror for personal reasons, against occupying powers. But is this the case for our Changez? 
 It is this type of person that the author most convincingly portrays. Our narrator smiles, offers you (yes, You, another dreadful second-person McInerney bit) some lovely Pakistani sweets and tea, sits in a charming part of Lahore, and engages in a long dictatorial monologue about the past, what events have shaped him into who he is, and what he plans to do. What moral high ground does he have? Not much. He speaks idealism about America's power bestriding the globe, but then lapses into Cold War Realpolitik about Indo-Pakistani relations and nuclear weapons. He drinks beer and lusts like the rest. 
 This book disappointed me. It wanted to look complex issues about nations, colonies, and religion in the eye, but instead blurred them further. I instead found the narrator's rotten mind more interesting. All of the tempting ideas previously outlined are only superficially treated. Perhaps I'm trying to pick up sugary crumbs from the ashes.