Palestinian. American. Comedian. Disabled. A Talk with Seema Yasmin About Maysoon Zayid: The Girl Who Can Can

Hey!

Any of you remember this book?:

It’s strange to consider any kind of a downside to the sheer hoardes of middle grade graphic novels coming out these days, but I am a little sad that sometimes really good and danged funny titles don’t make the splash they could have even a decade ago.

Shiny Misfits was one of those real rarities. It was penned by a female comedian. A female Palestinian-American comedian. A female Palestinian-American comedian with cerebral palsy. And apart from its creator’s general awesomeness, it was a really different kind of book too. One where the jokes flew so fast that it could take a reader a little while to catch up. I loved it, and I loved that it introduced me to Maysoon Zayid.

Turns out, there’s another way to meet Maysoon Zayid these days, and it comes to us via the Pulitzer-nominated Muslim reporter Dr. Seema Yasmin. Dr. Yasmin has penned Maysoon Zayid The Girl Who Can Can (on sale 2/10/2026), part of the “Muslim Mavericks” series coming out from Simon & Schuster. It’s a chapter book biography of Maysoon, her work, and her life.

And as Dr. Yasmin was up for an interview, I had a couple questions in mind to ask.

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Betsy Bird: Seema! Thank you so much for joining me today and answering some of my questions! Can’t help but confess that I’m a bit excited about the upcoming release of MAYSOON ZAYID: THE GIRL WHO CAN CAN. Can you tell me a bit about why Maysoon and why a bio about her?

Dr. Seema Yasmin: I’m so glad you’re excited! I am thrilled that many more people will get to learn about this brilliant woman in volume one of the Muslim Mavericks biographical series. Maysoon is one of the best living, stand-up comedians; she’s also an author, actress, and an activist. She’s witty, hilarious and adept at using her words and her platform to entertain and call people out on their BS! Maysoon grew up in New Jersey to Palestinian parents who sent her and her siblings to visit their grandparents in a Palestinian village most summers. She was born with cerebral palsy and dreamt of a career as an all-around entertainer. Many times along this journey, including when she was a child, she was told straight to her face by teachers that she could not and would not fulfill her dream because of her disability. There are too few stories about disabled women, about Muslim women, about Palestinian women in middle grade literature, and this book, which is the first of the Muslim Maverick series, invites readers to get to know Maysoon and how her faith has shaped her.

Betsy Bird: So tell us a bit about how one goes about researching a book of this sort. Did you have any contact with Maysoon herself or did you just read up on her and her work/life?

Seema: I have long been a fan of her stand-up comedy and her writing because of the strength of her voice and her radical truth telling. I reached out to Maysoon to conduct an interview for this book, but I also immersed myself in her live comedy shows, online videos, writing, and interviews.

BB: How do you decide what elements to include and what elements to cut out? And was there anything you wanted to have in the book that for one reason or another you simply couldn’t put in?

Seema: It’s hard when someone has lived such a fascinating life already and you want to put everything into the book, but of course that would not serve the story. I wrote an outline early on which helped me focus on one particular incident to start the book. That incident was young Maysoon wanting to attend the same school as her siblings and being told that she was too different to attend their school. I used that to help me focus the story on a young girl’s dreams and how people in her life both challenged and supported her and how this shaped her determination.

BB: Was there anything you learned about Maysoon in the course of things that surprised you in any way?

Seema: I am a doctor and a science journalist and therefore I am familiar with cerebral palsy. And yet, I remember asking Maysoon what it felt like to have the muscle spasms and shaking that she does as a result of cerebral palsy, and being taken aback when she said it’s really painful. As an able-bodied person, I didn’t want to think about her being in near constant pain. It made me uncomfortable, which is ridiculous, but it’s something I want to share about the experience of being an able-bodied person writing about a disabled person. Our own assumptions and discomfort can get in the way. And sadly, medical education, too often, reinforces ableism more than it challenges it. I included that point in the story alongside the explanation of cerebral palsy, which is tailored to the middle grade reader, while also explaining that people with CP experience a range of varied symptoms.

BB: I’m really glad you brought that up. Finally, are you working on any other titles in the Muslim Mavericks series?

Seema: Yes! Maysoon’s story is volume one in the series. Volume two is about Mo Farah, the world record breaking Olympic athlete who was trafficked from Somaliland to the UK as a young boy. Muslim Mavericks, as far as I know, although I’d love to be corrected on this, is the first biographical middle grade series that tells the stories of Muslim athletes, entertainers and scientists. There are 2 billion of us on the planet and we are not a monolith— Muslims represent many cultures and philosophies on faith— and there are plenty more phenomenal stories to tell in this series. Watch this space!

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Consider that space watched!

Boy, I like it when people write books celebrating women who know how to tap into hilarity. A big thank you to Dr. Yasmin for answering all my questions today, and also to Maryam Ahmad and the team at Simon and Schuster Children’s Publishing for helping to put this discussion together. Maysoon Zayid The Girl Who Can Can is, as I mentioned before, on sale February 10, 2026, so be sure to get it in your preorder carts today.

Filed under: Interviews