My Father's Notebook
A Novel of Iran
On Sale: 03/27/2007
My Father's Notebook
A Novel of Iran
On Sale: 03/27/2007
Format:
About the Book
When he was a boy, Aga Akbar, the deaf-mute illegitimate son of a Persian nobleman, traveled with his uncle to a cave on nearby Saffron Mountain. Once there, he was to copy a three-thousand-year-old cuneiform inscription—an order of the first king of Persia—as a means of freeing himself from his emotional confinement. For the remainder of his life, Aga Akbar used these cuneiform characters to fill a notebook with writings only he could understand. Years later, his son, Ishmael—a political dissident in exile—is attempting to translate the notebook . . . and in the process tells his father's story, his own, and the story of twentieth-century Iran.
A stunning and ambitious novel by a singular literary talent, My Father's Notebook is at once a masterful chronicle of a culture's troubled voyage into modernity and the poignant, timeless tale of a son's enduring love.
Critical Praise
“A field guide to present day Iran... MY FATHER’S NOTEBOOK is a winning, courtly tale of Persian culture.” — Buffalo News
“Wonderful... Blends contemporary realism with Persian folklore, mirroring Iran’s... history through the eyes of a father and his son.” — Houston Chronicle
“MY FATHER’S NOTEBOOK, a lovely novel, has the cadence of a fairy tale and the clarity of truth .” — Wall Street Journal
“A storyteller of utmost subtlety and natural ease.” — Times Literary Supplement
“Moving and illuminating . . . The history of Iran in the 20th century glints through.” — Publishers Weekly
“An intimate portrait... Abdolah’s prose... is clean and lyrical... A sweeping novel that chronicles the tumultuous modern history of [Iran].” — Kirkus Reviews
“Myth and unlovely reality meet and mingle... Conveys the heartache of an exile who cannot help but feel a traitor.” — Christian Science Monitor
“Beautiful and poetic.” — Library Journal
“Remarkable . . . Moving, dreamlike . . . Scenes are beautifully rendered.” — Providence Journal
-Product Details
- ISBN: 9780060598723
- ISBN 10: 0060598727
- Imprint: Harper Perennial
- On Sale: 03/27/2007
- Pages: 336
- List Price:19.99 CAD
- BISAC1 : FICTION / Political
- BISAC2 : FICTION / Fairy Tales, Folk Tales, Legends & Mythology
- BISAC3 : FICTION / Historical
- BISAC4 : FICTION / Epistolary
- BISAC5 : FICTION: World Literature / Middle East / General
