Persian Girls: A Memoir [Bargain Price] [Paperback]

Nahid Rachlin (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 27, 2007

For many years, heartache prevented Nahid Rachlin from turning her sharp novelist's eye inward: to tell the story of how her own life diverged from that of her closest confidante and beloved sister, Pari. Growing up in Iran, both refused to accept traditional Muslim mores, and dreamed of careers in literature and on the stage. Their lives changed abruptly when Pari was coerced by their father into marrying a wealthy and cruel suitor. Nahid narrowly avoided a similar fate, and instead negotiated with him to pursue her studies in America.

When Nahid received the unsettling and mysterious news that Pari had died after falling down a light of stairs, she traveled back to Iran-now under the Islamic regime-to find out what happened to her truest friend, confront her past, and evaluate what the future holds for the heartbroken in a tale of crushing sorrow, sisterhood, and ultimately, hope.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This lyrical and disturbing memoir by the author of four novels (Foreigner, etc.) tells the story of an Iranian girl growing up in a culture where, despite the Westernizing reforms of the Shah, women had little power or autonomy. As an infant in 1946, Rachlin was given to her mother's favorite sister, a widow who had been unable to conceive, and was lovingly raised among supportive widows who took refuge in religion from their frustrations as women in an oppressive society. But at the age of nine, Rachlin's father, whom she barely knew, met her at school without warning and brought her to Ahvaz to live with her birth family. Miserable in the new household, young Nahid was befriended by her American movie–obsessed sister Pari. Both sisters developed artistic ambitions, but only Nahid managed to escape the typical female fate, convincing her father to send her to college in the U.S. Less lucky is Pari, whose life of arranged marriage, divorce from an abusive husband and estrangement from her son ends in depression and early death. Exuding the melancholy of an outsider, this memoir gives American readers rare insight into Iranians' ambivalence toward the United States, the desire for American freedom clashing with resentment of American hegemony. (Oct. 5)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

Nahid's life plays out against a backdrop of tragedy. She has escaped to America, but she's lost so much of what she loved...the author doesn't comment directly on the meaning of these events. She just tells the tales of individuals crushed. This is just a story of how it was, during a certain period of time, for one upper-middle-class family in Iran, destroyed from within and without by forces it couldn't begin to reckon with. -- Carolyn See, The Washington Post --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 293 pages
• Publisher: Tarcher (December 27, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1585426237
• ASIN: B001G8WO22
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (40 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #916,706 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

BRIEF BIO http://www.nahidrachlin.com

Nahid Rachlin attended Columbia University MFA program on a Doubleday-Columbia Fellowship and then went on to Stanford University MFA program on a Stegner Fellowship. Her publications include a memoir, PERSIAN GIRLS (Penguin), four novels, JUMPING OVER FIRE (City Lights), FOREIGNER (W.W. Norton), MARRIED TO A STRANGER (E.P.Dutton), THE HEART'S DESIRE (City Lights), and a collection of short stories, VEILS (City Lights). Her individual stories have appeared in about fifty magazines. One of her stories was produced by Symphony Space, "Selected Shorts" and was aired on NPR radio stations around the country.
Her work has received favorable reviews in major magazines and newspapers and translated into Portuguese, Dutch, Arabic, and Farsi. She has written reviews and essays for New York Times, Newsday, Washington Post and Los Angeles Times. She received many awards, including the Bennet Cerf Award, PEN Syndicated Fiction Project Award, and a National Endowment for the Arts grant.
She has been interviewed in magazines such as Poets & Writers and AWP Writers Chronicle, and TV such as Channel 13, and on NPR's such as Fresh Air, Terry Gross, All Things Considered.
Read a recent review of PERSIAN GIRLS: http://www.brooklyntoday.info/features/465-persian-girls.html

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 20 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Triumphant and a Must Read for Women October 4, 2007

By J. A Carty

Format:Hardcover

I read "Persian Girls" very quickly. I think this was in large part due to the simplicity, yet power, of the writing. The only complaint I have with the memoir is that at times it felt that there was something under the surface that the author still could not say about her relationships with the women in her life. There is a feeling of non-resolution, but--strangely enough--I also felt the author was comfortable with that ambiguity.

I think all women should read this book, especially women in America. I already knew a good bit about the repression of women in other countries but the simple, straightforward matter in which Rachlin recounts her life is one that will be easy for anyone to read. Easy in the reading, but sad in the subject matter.

There is probably a lot that could be said about this memoir but for me--on a personal note--I came away wanting to know more about the Iranian women I have known throughout my life (my uncle married an Iranian woman) and what brought them to this country. Did they ever see their families after they left? How much of their culture do they still feel drawn to etc?

Nothing works like good non-fiction to get me thinking about myself and what I bring to the world.

Good read. (I read over the span of two flights, so I would suggest it for a plane read for sure!)

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Just finished Nahid Rachlin's fascinating memoir... April 3, 2007

By Christine S. Gressick

Format:Hardcover

Well, Mrs. Rachlin has gained another fan.

I was just mesmerized with the weave of her writings, in "Persian Girls". A fascinating depiction of the life, culture and traditions in Iran as she experienced them, and how they related to and affected her family and friends.

I reccomend this book as a good read.

Thank you Nahid Rachlin...

15 of 17 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars BOLD, UPLIFTING MEMOIR January 9, 2007

By I. Appleton

Format:Hardcover

After chancing upon a diminuative author reading a startlingly gutsy memoir to a bookstore audience, I ordered and read for myself the courageous adventures of Ms. Rachlin. The author's uncompromising rebelliousness coupled with her intense love for a sister and an aunt fuels the book. Bejeweled with many Iranian cultural details, (foods, fabrics, flowers, fountains, families, etc.), lovingly and simply described and set at the menacing center of turbulent historical and individual events, Nahid Rachlin has forged a spare, luminous memoir of human sorrows and victories. I think other readers will wish, as I did, that the book was longer.