Siba Shakib

Uy, hard to know what to say about this book. Yes, it's fictional, but it's also the truth for millions. It's embarrassingly painful to know that your own country, your own tax dollars are at work destroying countries, lives, every day.

Shirin-Gol is a woman who becomes a bride at the age of 14. Her brother sold her to a man for his gambling debt. Because the government doesn't protect its people by giving them access to birth control, she had baby after baby after baby, a husband who, though he became an opium-head, still managed to impregnate her time and again. Most of their lives, they went hungry. Her story has a happy ending; if only it were so for the billions of overpopulated humans in this world.… (más)

This is not an easy novel to read, but it felt necessary to me, given the war that my country is waging in this country. It’s written simply and fluidly, with no analysis or explanation. Each character’s actions explain everything.

It’s the story of Shirin-Gol’s life, beginning when she is a child, and ending when she is a grandmother. It describes how she lives during the Russian invasion, during the tribal wars, and during the rule of the Taliban. It shows how she gives in, resists, escapes, wanders, finds homes, and loses homes.

In her family, there are separations and reunions. Sometimes there is something to eat, sometimes not. Sometimes she is confined to a room, sometimes she is free to work. Sometimes she finds solidarity with other women, sometimes she has no way to connect with anyone, and cannot even see their faces. It’s a haunting book, terribly sad. Shirin-Gol has nothing but a little hope to lean against. Yet still she survives.

… (más)