books, is receiving plenty of love and gratitude as well. “Without your books we wouldn’t have met this incredible cast and its incredible people,” one Twitter usersaidAnother fanadded“@jennyhan Sasha says her signature ’do sometimes baffles hairstylists on shoots. “It really hurt in the beginning, because I felt like that 7-year-old girl again who is in a white hair salon, and I felt so ugly or like a burden,” Sasha tells me. The Texas-born daughter of a New Zealander mother and an African American father, Sasha was a well-mannered kid who played basketball and loved reading books in her closet. She always felt like an outsider, and that sense of not belonging hasn’t gone away. “I’ve had people call me a house slave. People think I’m not black or white enough. Or professionally they’re like, ‘Oh, she’s mixed. She can’t play this white role,’ or ‘It’s just we want a black girl, but you’re too light, and we won’t get enough credit for a black girl.’” Nijeer Parks was bewildered when he was arrested and taken into custody in February 2019. Apparently, he’d been accused of "My mother doesn’t understand why representation is so important to me,” Halima told the publication. “Of course, she wants the same things for me that all parents want for their children — that I be of service, be a good person, lead an honest life, work hard and get an education. But, at the same time, she doesn’t know the struggle I faced growing up in America and being in spaces whereI was the only hijab-wearing girlor the only girl who looked like me.”