Hossein Tanzifi, a young English interpreter for American advisors in Iran, is caught at a crossroads when he witnesses the assassination of an American adviser by thirteen army officers. Hossein, who had no role in the incident, is sentenced to life in prison. Fourteen people were executed for the murder and he is the only one who knows what happened and who is covering it up. Eighteen years later, during the Iranian revolution, Hossein is released from prison and while dodging his own murder, he searches for the one woman who can unveil the truth. The story, as told by this world-famous novelist, is a historical fiction, character-driven novel narrated from different perspectives. It weaves together the plights of characters from opposite hemispheres of the world. It is renowned for being the single most accurate depiction of the social atmosphere of Iran from 1959 to 1979 which led up to the overthrow of the Pahlavi dynasty under Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi through a popular uprising and its replacement with the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Reza Baraheni is a widely respected poet, novelist and critic. He was imprisoned under the Shah and was banned by and had to seek exile from the Islamic Republic of Iran. His prison poems God's Shadow were published in translation by Indiana UP in 1976 and his essays Crowned Cannibals : Writings On Repression In Iran were also published in the US and widely read at the time. A number of his novels have been translated into French over the past fifteen years and published in Paris by Fayard. The range of his concerns, as well as his constant anti-imperialism and resistance to oppression has not endeared him to any of his country's regimes. He has lived in exile in Toronto for many years and is a former president of PEN Canada.

Reza Baraheni's profile page

Aleca Baraheni is a translator based in Vienna, Virginia.

Aleca Baraheni's profile page