Khurrum Rahman's "East of Hounslow"

Khurrum Rahman is a west London boy who now lives in Berkshire with his wife and two sons.

Here he dreamcasts an adaptation of East of Hounslow, his first novel and the first in the Jay Qasim series:

East of Hounslow centres around young British Muslim, Jay Qasim. A small-time dope dealer living in West London, who lives at home with his Mum and has just bought his pride and joy – a black BMW. Life seems sweet. What Jay doesn’t realise is that he is being carefully watched by MI5, who feel that he is just the man to infiltrate a terrorist cell, thousands of miles East of Hounslow.

As an author, maybe I shouldn’t say this, but my first love is the movies. If I go longer than a couple of weeks without going to the cinema, I start to get withdrawal symptoms. I simply adore the experience of watching a film over a tub of popcorn. It’s the ultimate escape.

I wrote East of Hounslow just like I would write a movie. I wanted the story to pop and come alive off the page where I could visualise Jay staring down at me from the screen and see the action running through my mind. The tone is based around some of my favourite films, combining the dialogue of Fargo and Reservoir Dogs, with the hard-hitting drama of Boyz ‘n the Hood and American History X.

I’ve always struggled to visualise an actor that could portray the role of Jay, I think he would have the attitude of Beverly Hill Cops’ Eddie Murphy, mixed in with a softness of Slumdog Millionaire’s Dev Patel, and the screen presence of True Romance’s Christian Slater. I don’t think that there is any actor, right now, who has that Jay look, though I do like the idea of an up and coming actor playing the role.

Direction, I would love to see East of Hounslow in the hands of the Coen Brothers to give it that distinctive, slightly off-beat style that they are so great at achieving. So, Ethan, Joel, if you’re reading this, give me a shout.

Follow Khurrum Rahman on Twitter.

--Marshal Zeringue