Exploring Top Books of Shelfari

Persepolis : The Story of a Childhood

by Marjane Satrapi

A New York Times Notable Book A Time Magazine “Best Comix of the Year” A San Francisco Chronicle and Los Angeles Times Best-seller Wise, funny, and heartbreaking, Persepolis is Marjane Satrapi’s memoir of growing up in Iran during the Islamic Revolution. In powerful black-and-white comic strip images, Satrapi tells the story of her life in Tehran from ages six to fourteen, years that saw the overthrow... (more)

Reading "Lolita" in Tehran

by Azar Nafisi

Every Thursday morning for two years in the Islamic Republic of Iran, Azar Nafisi, a bold and inspired teacher, secretly gathered seven of her most committed female students to read forbidden Western classics. Some came from conservative and religious families, others were progressive and secular; some had spent time in jail. They were shy and uncomfortable at first, unaccustomed to being asked to speak their... (more)

Persepolis 2: The Story of a Return

by Marjane Satrapi

In Persepolis, heralded by the Los Angeles Times as “one of the freshest and most original memoirs of our day,” Marjane Satrapi dazzled us with her heartrending memoir-in-comic-strips about growing up in Iran during the Islamic Revolution. Here is the continuation of her fascinating story. In 1984, Marjane flees fundamentalism and the war with Iraq to begin a new life in Vienna. Once there, she faces the trials... (more)

The Complete Persepolis: Now a Major Motion Picture

The Complete Persepolis: Now a Major Motion Picture

by Marjane Satrapi

Here, in one volume: Marjane Satrapi's best-selling, internationally acclaimed memoir-in-comic-strips. Persepolis is the story of Satrapi's unforgettable childhood and coming of age within a large and loving family in Tehran during the Islamic Revolution; of the contradictions between private life and public life in a country plagued by political upheaval; of her high school years in Vienna facing the trails of... (more)

The House of Sand and Fog

by Andre Dubus III

"Elegant and powerful...an unusual and volatile...literary thriller." -- Washington Post Book World In this riveting novel of almost unbearable suspense, three fragile yet determined people become dangerously entangled in a relentlessly escalating crisis. Colonel Behrani, once a wealthy man in Iran, is now a struggling immigrant willing to bet everything he has to restore his family's dignity. Kathy... (more)

Not Without My Daughter

by Betty Mahmoody

'You are here for the rest of your life. Do you understand? You are not leaving Iran. You are here until you die.' Betty Mahmoody and her husband, Dr Sayyed Bozorg Mahmoody ('Moody'), came to Iran from the USA to meet Moody's family. With them was their four-year-old daughter, Mahtob. Appalled by the squalor of their living conditions, horrified by what she saw of a country where women are merely chattels and... (more)

Veil of Roses

by Laura Fitzgerald

This compelling debut follows one spirited young woman from the confines of Iran to the intoxicating freedom of America—where she discovers not only an enticing new country but the roots of her own independence. . . . Tamila Soroush wanted it all. But in the Islamic Republic of Iran, dreams are a dangerous thing for a girl. Knowing they can never come true, Tami abandons them. . . . Until her twenty-fifth... (more)

The Septembers of Shiraz

by Dalia Sofer

In the aftermath of the Iranian revolution, rare-gem dealer Isaac Amin is arrested, wrongly accused of being a spy. Terrified by his disappearance, his family must reconcile a new world of cruelty and chaos with the collapse of everything they have known. As Isaac navigates the tedium and terrors of prison, forging tenuous trusts, his wife feverishly searches for him, suspecting, all the while, that their... (more)

The Blood of Flowers: A Novel

by Anita Amirrezvani

In 17th-century Persia, a 14-year-old woman believes she will be married within the year. But when her beloved father dies, she and her mother find themselves alone and without a dowry. With nowhere else to go, they are forced to sell the brilliant turquoise rug the young woman has woven to pay for their journey to Isfahan, where they will work as servants for her uncle, a rich rug designer in the court of the... (more)

Funny in Farsi: A Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America

Funny in Farsi: A Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America

by Firoozeh Dumas

This new Readers Circle edition includes a reading group guide and a conversation between Firoozeh Dumas and Khaled Hosseini, author of The Kite Runner .” In 1972, when she was seven, Firoozeh Dumas and her family moved from Iran to Southern California, arriving with no firsthand knowledge of this country beyond her father’s glowing memories of his graduate school years here. More family soon followed, and the... (more)

Embroideries

by Marjane Satrapi

From the best–selling author of Persepolis comes this gloriously entertaining and enlightening look into the sex lives of Iranian women. Embroideries gathers together Marjane’s tough–talking grandmother, stoic mother, glamorous and eccentric aunt and their friends and neighbors for an afternoon of tea drinking and talking. Naturally, the subject turns to love, sex and the vagaries of men. As the afternoon... (more)

All the Shah's Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror

All the Shah's Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror

by Stephen Kinzer

This is the first full-length account of the CIA's coup d'etat in Iran in 1953—a covert operation whose consequences are still with us today. Written by a noted New York Times journalist, this book is based on documents about the coup (including some lengthy internal CIA reports) that have now been declassified. Stephen Kinzer's compelling narrative is at once a vital piece of history, a cautionary tale, and a... (more)

The Saffron Kitchen

by Yasmin Crowther

A passionate and timely debut about mothers and daughters, roots and exile, from the streets of Iran to the suburbs of London In what is certain to be one of the most talked-about fiction debuts of the year, Yasmin Crowther paints a magnificent portrait of betrayal and retribution set against a backdrop of Iran’s tumultuous history, dramatic landscapes, and cultural beauty. The story begins on a blustery... (more)

Chicken with Plums

by Marjane Satrapi

In her acclaimed Persepolis books and in Embroideries , Marjane Satrapi rendered the events of her life and times in a uniquely captivating and powerful voice and vision. Now she turns that same keen eye and ear to the heartrending story of her great-uncle, a celebrated Iranian musician who gave up his life for music and love. We are in Tehran in 1958, and Nasser Ali Khan, one of Iran’s most revered tar... (more)

Lipstick Jihad: A Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America And American in Iran

Lipstick Jihad: A Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America And American in Iran

by Azadeh Moaveni

Now in trade paperback with a Reader's Guide inside: A "compelling...guided tour through the underground youth culture in Tehran...an illuminating book." ( The New York Times ) A favorite of readers and critics nationwide, Lipstick Jihad is now available in the format most likely to appeal to its natural market-and it now includes a wealth of new material to interest readers and reading groups. Azadeh Moaveni... (more)

Prisoner of Tehran: A Memoir

by Marina Nemat

What would you give up to protect your loved ones? Your life? In her heartbreaking, triumphant, and elegantly written memoir, Prisoner of Tehran , Marina Nemat tells the heart-pounding story of her life as a young girl in Iran during the early days of Ayatollah Khomeini's brutal Islamic Revolution. In January 1982, Marina Nemat, then just sixteen years old, was arrested, tortured, and sentenced to death for... (more)

Pomegranate Soup: A Novel

by Marsha Mehran

Beneath the holy mountain Croagh Patrick, in damp and lovely County Mayo, sits the small, sheltered village of Ballinacroagh. To the exotic Aminpour sisters, Ireland looks like a much-needed safe haven. It has been seven years since Marjan Aminpour fled Iran with her younger sisters, Bahar and Layla, and she hopes that in Ballinacroagh, a land of “crazed sheep and dizzying roads,” they might finally find a home. ... (more)

Digging to America

by Anne Tyler

In what is perhaps her richest and most deeply searching novel, Anne Tyler gives us a story about what it is to be an American, and about Maryam Yazdan, who after Thirty-five years in this country must finally come to terms with her “outsiderness.” Two families, who would otherwise never have come together, meet by chance at the Baltimore airport—the Donaldsons, a very American couple, and the Yazdans, Maryam’s... (more)

Iran Awakening: A Memoir of Revolution and Hope

Iran Awakening: A Memoir of Revolution and Hope

by Shi?ri?n ?Iba?di?, Azadeh Moaveni

The moving, inspiring memoir of one of the great women of our times, Shirin Ebadi, winner of the 2003 Nobel Peace Prize and advocate for the oppressed, whose spirit has remained strong in the face of political persecution and despite the challenges she has faced raising a family while pursuing her work. Best known in this country as the lawyer working tirelessly on behalf of Canadian photojournalist, Zara... (more)

Persepolis Boxed Set

by Marjane Satrapi

Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood Wise, funny, and heartbreaking, Persepolis is Marjane Satrapi’s memoir of growing up in Iran during the Islamic Revolution. In powerful black-and-white comic strip images, Satrapi tells the story of her life in Tehran from ages six to fourteen, years that saw the overthrow of the Shah’s regime, the triumph of the Islamic Revolution, and the devastating effects of war with... (more)

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Tags: iran

by Marjane Satrapi

by Azar Nafisi

by Marjane Satrapi

by Marjane Satrapi

by Andre Dubus III

by Betty Mahmoody

by Laura Fitzgerald

by Dalia Sofer

by Anita Amirrezvani

by Firoozeh Dumas

by Marjane Satrapi

by Stephen Kinzer

by Yasmin Crowther

by Marjane Satrapi

by Azadeh Moaveni

by Marina Nemat

by Marsha Mehran

by Anne Tyler

by Shi?ri?n ?Iba?di?, Azadeh Moaveni

by Marjane Satrapi