In The Unforgettable Queens of Islam, Shahla Haeri surveys Muslim women leaders from the medieval to the modern era and records this by “gendering Islamic political history” in which women leaders subverted a stereotypical historical narrative that involves only the achievements of elite men (p. 230). The majority of Muslim societies are patriarchal, and women reached the highest echelons by securing a role in the traditionally male-dominated field. In three sections, this book tells a story about six women leaders: the Queen of Sheba, A'isha Bint Abu Bakr (614–78), Queen Arwa (1048–1138) of Yemen, Razia Sultan (1205–40) of India, Benazir Bhutto (1953–2007) of Pakistan, and Megawati Sukarnoputri (b. 1947) of Indonesia.

In the first section, Haeri covers the Queen of Sheba and A'isha Bint Abu Bakr by incorporating their histories with Qur'anic and Hadith perspectives. In the second section, Haeri narrates the story of two medieval queens, Arwa of Yemen and Razia Sultan of India, and modern leaders Benazir Bhutto and Megawati Sukarnoputri are the highlights of the third section. In addition to these rulers, Haeri briefly documents other women's critical roles in their sovereignties as mothers, wives, concubines, slave girls, and princesses. For example, she discusses Sitt al-Mulk (Lady of Power), the daughter of al-Aziz, the fifth Ismaili Fatimid caliph, who raised a private army after her father's death against her younger brother al-Hakim's claim to the throne (p. 15).

Though gender became less relevant for these Muslim queens and leaders once they secured their seat of power, they still encountered a glass ceiling in the form of the prophetic hadith, “never will succeed such a nation” that “makes a woman their ruler” (p. 51). The validity of this hadith is debatable, and many considered it “forged,” yet in Muslim-majority countries, religious and political elites flagged this hadith to revoke the supremacy of women (p. 2). Haeri explains how this hadith was a political tool used to satisfy the “traditional patriarchal domination” (p. 25). It is evident from the case of Pakistan that the religious political party Jamaat-e Islami (JI) filed a case against Benazir Bhutto based on this hadith, showing the “blatant hypocrisy of the political elite,” as the JI had previously supported Fatima Jinnah, sister of Mohammad Ali Jinnah, in the 1965 presidential elections (p. 155).

Women's history in Pakistan has always followed an extraordinary trajectory. From the independence of the country, women activists rallied for their social and political rights. Whether for resisting extremism or political supremacy in a patriarchal country, the names of Pakistani women, such as Malala Yousafzai and Benazir Bhutto (r. 1988–90 and 1993–96), are widely known. From Fatima Mernissi's exploration of lives and reign of the Muslim queens in The Forgotten Queens of Islam to Haeri's The Unforgettable Queens of Islam, Bhutto has a unique place.Footnote ¹ Haeri finds a parallel in Benazir Bhutto's political ascension with Indonesia's fifth president, Megawati Sukarnoputri (r. 2001–04). Both were close to their fathers and accompanied them to local and international gatherings, where they witnessed the art of politics, and they both eventually inherited their father's political supremacies.

Few Muslim women rulers appear in the historical narrative from the seventh century to the present. Women were only allowed to rule in the absence of a male heir, or rarely when the ineptitude of sons left the seats available for female family members. Haeri connects how Muslim women leaders like Megawati overcame political confrontations by proving herself a “canny politician” who was able to silence her opponents’ chants calling her a “stupid housewife” (p. 212). The women leaders also responded tactfully, as Benazir Bhutto did by emphasizing her association with the common people by calling herself their Bari Ammi Jan (Dear Great Mother) and “sister” and celebrating her wedding with the underprivileged community in Lyari, Pakistan, her political stronghold (p. 181).

Haeri concludes by overviewing the patrilineal political structure and the paradoxical representation of women leaders in transnational and transhistorical contexts. Haeri elucidates prejudicial representation of these Muslim leaders in male chroniclers’ and biographers’ accounts for “systematically ignoring or downplaying the people and the followers” (p. 225). The massive and overwhelming support for Benazir Bhutto and Megawati Sukarnoputri made such claims erroneous, as well as the remembrance of Queen Arwa and Razia Sultan in the collective consciousness. The numerous epic films and television shows about Razia Sultan in the Muslim-minority country of India shed light on the obsession with women rulers among a popular audience. Haeri utilizes extensive classical documents for information about medieval queens, such as the Muslim scholar Minhaj Siraj al-Din Juzjani's (1193–1260) Tabaqat-i Nasiri for Razia Sultan. In the case of Benazir Bhutto, Haeri interviewed her confidants, including Victoria Schofield, Peter Galbraith, Asma Jahangir, and the Pakistani ambassador Shamsul Hasan. Overall, The Unforgettable Queens of Islam is an insightful read and captivating for general audiences and students of history alike, offering them reading outside the history of powerful men.