Customer Reviews

Unveiled

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(10)

 

 

A most interesting book form a plucky young lady. I knew her through her many informative articles for the economist and was delighted to be able to get a longer read. The book, apart from being more than readable, gives us a description of modern day Iran through the eyes of someone who does not have any kind of 'agenda':
She goes out there as a journalist (rather a brave act in itself), to see and to report. Whether on the political or personal front she remains lucid and a great story teller to the end.

A gripping, unforgettable work which made me laugh and cry, sometimes both at the same time. Written by a respected British journalist whose innocent genetic love for her country of origin takes her out to Iran where she makes heroic efforts to make the reality confirm her idealised image of what should be 'Persia'. Her individual and eccentric personality is rapidly sculpted, and honed, from within, to fit into an artificial entity called The Islamic Republic. It is from this perspective that she gives us a unique glimpse of a man-made state. A tragedy, on a personal and national level, from which she finally emerges with her innocence intact - to continue life in her natural dual state so well encapsulated in the endearing shortened version of her Persian name - nothing to do with a fruit!

Many of the reviews here say this book is outdated, but if you look at http://www.iranfocus.com/modules/news/index.php?storytopic=6 or http://www.iranfocus.com under the subject of women you will see it is still slavery for women in Iran. I found this book powerful, scary, sad, terrifying and tragic. This if very important information for us to read, and to realize how complete and complex the oppression is in Iran, especially for women, and how it impacts on every aspect of their lives.

I expected to learn something by reading this book, but unfortunately it's very poorly written and edited--I think both author and publisher are at fault here. Worse, I felt no sympathy at all for this woman by the end of the book--and I'm a feminist! This is not the memoirs of a sane or rational person. She is certainly largely to blame for her troubles, in fact I think she's as mentally unstable as her husband. I bought this book merely for one's woman's perspective on what it must be like to live in Iran, but the book failed to deliver even that. The author lacks any insight into her own mental state and her descriptions of daily life are vague and confused.

this book was written a long time ago in the perspective of iranian time this is a country who experienced a reveloution 20 years ago it is fast developing - the account of no makeup being allowed is out of date along with many other issues. Iran is developing very quickly and even though it is true that now women are much freer. (i visited iran summer 2000) Even 3 years ago most of the freedoms i took for granted this year were non-exsistant - iran is a rapidly developing country and this is an account of one womans experiences. I think it is good to make people aware of the suffering which has occured and still occurs - and the fact wich is still very much a reality that women, at least in public veiw are classed as a controlled sex and have very little choice in their public lives because of the governments need to control - but it gives a bad veiw of iran. Literature about Iran must be like the country itself developing, read this book but keep in mind, people deal with situations in different ways - there are many different families and lives in Iran and this is only a (now almost outdated) glimps into one of the lives - lets hope Iran keeps developing and stories like this become wholly outdated because in my opinion Iran is a beautiful and historical country who can benfit with the freedom of both its men and women.

As an Iranian woman who has experienced life in both pre and post revolutionary Iran, I absolutely loved this book. Because this book unveiled the ugly truth about women's condition in Iran, especially in the late 80s/early 90s, many fellow Iranians have criticised this book. Iran's image has been ruined due to political and media's exaggeration of some events in the past 2 decades; We can't efford to have anymore negative images of Iran being told to the people abroad. However, regardless of country's image or what not, I believe that almost every word written in the book is absolute truth. It is well written without cover ups. We must tell more of these truthful stories about Iranian women and their terrible position in the Islamic tyranny of Iran.

A very stereotype-filled book, totally superficial and misleading. For example, many of the laws regarding the status of women in iran which this author mentions (such as needing the written permission of a father or husband to travel abroad) were in place before the 1979 Islamic revolution when the US-backed Shah was in power, and as for the "oppressive" chador - it is the standard clothing of the vast majority of Iranian women who simply consider it normal part of their customary clothes, just as a typical Western woman considers pants or a blouse to be "normal." Despite the stereotype of the "oppressed hareem girl" promoted by this book, Iranian women are in fact highly politically active, are regularly elected to public office, and were active participants in the 1979 Islamic revolution. Things are not as black-and-white as this book implies. The reader would therefore do better to look elsewhere for an accurate and unbiased exposition of gender roles in modern, post-revolutionary Iran.

Our women's book club overall found the book to be too "chatty" and very difficult to follow, especially when discussing her myriad family and friends. What was interesting, however, is that this book engendered a very lively discussion on Iran, the role of women, and Western bias in understanding different cultures. Daughter of Persia was mentioned as a better book to read. In all, we felt this was not a great book, but was a good discussion book for a book club.

Having been born to a well educated professional Iranian family myself, and having lived in Iran during those post revolutionary years, I find it very hard to believe that an Oxford educated woman in her mid thirties, would claim to come from "nobility" and to have family members married off at 14 yrs of age tolerating wife beating husbands who would take additional wives and steal their fortune. I also cannot understand how a woman who has been brought up in the West and is supposedly a journalist, would jump into a marriage with a revolutionary without investigating the person's background, to later discover that he had another wife??? These are just a few questions that would cross any reader's mind.
During the 13 years which I lived in post-revolutionary Iran, I had only heard about these type occurences in the lower middle class or low SES families. I have seen Iranian women (those who I associated with) as very dignified, well educated and respectable (and respected by their husbands). If they were to fall into a trap as described by Ms. Mostashar, they would get out. Any person who has some understanding of the changes which have taken place after the falling of the Shah's regime would attest to how the Women's rights movement in Iran has progressed. I think Mrs. Shirin Ebadi, the 2003 Nobel Peace Prize winner would say the same. I do not claim that the system is perfect, but it is definitely improving. I think that the likes of Ms. Mostashar and Ms. Betty Mahmoudi have had bad experiences, with some trashy people in Iran, and have used their experience as a means of generalizing and stereotyping the Iranians. Also, Ms. Mostashar has somewhat turned her "biography" into a trashy novel, which may be a marketing technique-this is quite distasteful. It appears that this biography has been used to seek revenge rather than to inform.

Somehow I did make it through this book, but it was only out of sheer force of will. It was poorly written and dull. I thoroughly enjoy books on Iran in particular and the Middle East in general, but this book was more of an exhausting sob story than it was an interesting autobiographical journey. There's only so many pages that a person can endure a laundry list of complaints. If you're looking for a journey into today's Iran, read "Searching for Hassan" or "Honeymoon in Purdah."