Ishq by Areej Shah

About this novel

Ishq (Urdu: عشق) by Areej Shah is a mysterious romance about Shehryar, a young man haunted for as long as he can remember by a girl’s voice calling his name. It opens in the middle of the night.

“Shehryar, may I come in? Shehryar, call me. Shehryar, let me come out…” The voice won’t leave him alone. He tosses and turns, exhausted after a long day, but just as he drifts off it starts again, and he gives up and switches on the light. He isn’t scared of it anymore; he’s used to it. Since he was old enough to understand anything, he has never slept a single peaceful night. He was sent away from his country and his family to Canada when he was only eight, and he has lived alone ever since.

“شہریار، مجھے باہر آنے دیں” — ایک آواز جو برسوں سے پیچھا کر رہی ہے۔

Tonight, as on so many nights, he grabs his jacket and heads to a club, hoping the noise will drown the voice out. It works for a while; among the crowd it sounds far away. When he was a child it sounded like a little girl, but now it has become a young woman’s voice. Who is she? How does she know his name? Why is she asking his permission to come out, and where is she, a prisoner? Shehryar knows almost nothing. He only knows that his mother forbade him ever to ask about it, and once told him that if he paid attention to the voice, he would go so far away from them that he could never come back. He wonders what fear made his parents keep their son so far from home.

Areej Shah builds a haunting, dreamlike mystery, and the title promises that the answer to the voice is bound up with love.

You can read Ishq online here or download the complete PDF for free. For more mysterious romances, read Dewana by Sabahat Khan or browse our Horror and mystery novels.