Helpful Score: 1
A compelling memoir about growing up in Iran and two lives shaped by different cultures and times.
Helpful Score: 1
Although subtitled a memoir, Persian Girls is really a tribute to the author's older sister Pari. Both girls want to resist traditional gender roles in pre-revolutionary Iran, but Pari is married off to a suitor her parents chose; Nahid escapes this fate by going to study in America. Pari remains unhappy, and her mysterious death from falling down a flight of stairs sends Nahid back, now to the Islamic Republic of Iran. Although I learned a bit more about growing up during the days of the Shah, the prose didn't jump off the page. The story was told, as opposed to shown, to the reader; much of it predictable and in simple language. However, it does provide a glimpse of another culture.
