I felt she didn't detail enough about her time in the Ministry. I understand she ran for president quickly, but her more recent achievements were big, and I would have liked to have read more about Fawzia Koofi today (or back in the late 2000s) instead of her childhood. ( )

I felt she didn't detail enough about her time in the Ministry. I understand she ran for president quickly, but her more recent achievements were big, and I would have liked to have read more about Fawzia Koofi today (or back in the late 2000s) instead of her childhood. ( )

A very succinct description of the changes that wrought Afghanistan in the past few decades. Quite an inspirational book too through the advice in the letters Fawzia wrote to her daughters. It was towards the end of the book that you realised why Fawzia wrote the book - to tell the world that Afghanistan cannot return to the Taliban days. There is one thing the publishers can do better - better proofreading, quite a number of grammar and factual errors I spotted. ( )

An inspiring book by an inspiring woman. Koofi grew up in a political family but also as a female in a country where they are treated as lower than dirt. But she was able to get an education, not find herself in an arranged marriage but instead partnered for love, and eventually become one of the first female politicians in Afghanistan. All this while growing up with the Soviet occupation, mujahideen, Taliban takover, wars, and threats on her life. A hera for our time. ( )

I am 56 years old; my mother taught me to read before I was knee high to the proverbial grasshopper - and I took to it. Needless to say then, that many many books have found their way into my hands. This is one of the most amazing: I have told you my age, I will now also divulge that I am a white middle class (OK very much lower middle class - poor as a church mouse) Englishman who has travelled no further than France and Belgium. You may by now, be,reasonably, asking what this has to do with a book review: the amazing thing that this book did was to turn me, for a couple of hours, into a young Afghan lady.

Fawzia Koofi is the speaker of the Afghan Parliament. She is also an inspiration, not just to women, not just to the Afghan population, but to every human being. This book tells, in her own words, both her struggle to get to her lofty position and something of her belief structure. I will not lie, at times it is hard for me to go along with her views - when she was young, her father would beat her mum should the rice served to guests not be sufficiently fluffy. Fawzia is happy that this attitude is slowly changing but is able to differentiate between this and the cruel treatment handed out by the Taliban, during their reign. The Taliban enjoyed inflicting pain whilst her dad was simply trying to improve her mum. This is hard for a Westerner to comprehend.

The book is painfully sad, in parts: the pointless torture and slow death of her husband caused tears and anger in equal parts, at least in this reader. However, it is heartening to know that a lady can attain such status in Afghanistan - after all, we chaps still have more chance of power in the West than the ladies. If I were to criticise it in any way, my complaint would be that this tome is too short. I could have happily read 500, 750 or even 1,000 pages about this lady without a trace of boredom. I can only hope that this is the first of a series of books that Fawzia Koofi will find time to write. ( )