I truly don't know what to think about this book. I'm in a strange place, because I actually met the author and heard her speak, and what she said was bold, impassioned and horrifying. She spoke well and seemed extremely genuine.

In fact, that's the reason I picked up the book.

Then, I read the book. And I'm not sure if it was the narrative voice she used, the way she phrased things, but overall, I found the book...well, to be honest, I found it a touch self-serving. In several different instances, she relates conversations where others told her she was brave, she was tough, she was beautiful. Maybe they happened, who am I to say they didn't, but even still, it seems a little conceited to toss them all in the story.

Spoilers:

And then there's the story. To be honest, if this had been presented as fiction, I would have hated it and torn into it for being far too coincidental. Why? She's imprisoned in a cruel place, but one of the overseers seems to take a shine to her. She's about to die and, with seconds left, she's spared due to this same person's impassioned pleas to the Imam. She's forced to marry the man, and, though he forcibly rapes her, she feels...not love, but at least something for him. She ingratiates herself into his family by relating a dream to her barren sister-in-law who, using a Christian prayer in an Islamic home, finds herself pregnant. Then,just when her husband manages to set things in motion to get her freed, she gets a full reset: he's killed and she loses his baby. Her murdered husband's family carries out his dying wish and gets her released. Her one true love waits for her and marries her, even though that's a crime punishable by death.

End of spoilers.

Again, maybe it all happened, who am I to say it didn't? But it's remarkably neat, isn't it?

Like I said, I don't know what to think about this book.
( )

I registered a book at BookCrossing.com!
http://www.BookCrossing.com/journal/12549014

I find memoirs by people from other countries interesting, as a rule. I especially like it when I can read two or three books about the same approximate time period from different perspectives, as it gives me a more rounded feeling for the country and the time. So this book interested me. I had read Reading Lolita in Tehran, which took place not long after the main events in this story. Both illuminate what Iran was like in the early days of the Islamic Republic of Iran (the country is still Islamic).

Marina Nemat was arrested at age 16 for activities against the state. She was in high school at the time, opposed to the new Islamic state and vocal about her objections. She was in the infamous Evin prison in Tehran for over two years.

Her story reads like a novel. Early on, she is rescued from the firing squad seconds before she would have been dead. Later, her rescuer, an interrogator at the prison, wants her to marry him, threatening harm to her family if she does not. He is assassinated, but lives long enough to ask his family to bring Marina back to her family.

I am not the only one who is skeptical about the details of this story. Several persons who were in Evin Prison around the same time have even written letters to the book publisher, saying she is not telling the whole story and is making some things up. For example, they say that anyone who would be permitted to marry an interrogator would have to be an informant. And they say the rescue from execution is simply not believable.

I would love to hear corroboration from some of the persons who were there, most particularly the family of the interrogator she married. Other prisoners who were in the same rooms with her might also be able to confirm some facts. I have not found this kind of information online, but I'm not saying it isn't there.

I found it a highly readable book with a lot of details about the regime and the prison. Worth reading, but with some skepticism. ( )

Autobiografische roman van een Iraanse jonge vrouw die in de Evingevangenis terechtkomt. Daar wordt ze gemarteld en bijna wordt ze geëxecuteerd. Maar de gevangenbewaarder is verliefd op haar geworden en redt haar op het nippertje. Om haar eigen leven en dat van haar familie te redden wordt ze gedwongen om met hem te trouwen en zich te bekeren tot de islam. Ze wordt op zich liefdevol opgevangen door de familie van haar echtgenoot. En hoewel ze dus eigenlijk gewoon gevangene blijft beseft ze dat haar man niet alleen maar slecht is, maar ook goede eigenschappen heeft.
Ik vind het moeilijk om een waardering toe te kennen aan dit boek; het verhaal is immers waargebeurd en hoe kun je daar een waardering aan hangen? Laat ik zeggen dat ik denk dat als deze schrijfster een fictieroman zou schrijven haar stijl mij hoogstwaarschijnlijk niet zou aanspreken.... ( )

Prisoner of Tehran by Canadian author, Marina Nemat is a memoir written in 2007.

A part Russian Christian girl caught up in the Iranian Revolution, she was held as a political prisoner for 2 years in the notorious Evin prison when she was sixteen years old under the regime of the Ayatollah Khomeini.

The author writes a riveting tale of torture, death, forced conversion and marriage. Her tone manages some balance while her emotionally gut wrenching ordeal is revealed.

Her parents are not sympathetic characters: her father is distant and her mother a temperamental woman who only showed her daughter affection sporadically. Thank goodness she had her Russian grandmother to love her during her childhood. Marina's relationships with her aunt, her friends and their families provided some comfort to her as well as the family of the husband she is forced to marry.

A real eye opener about the gender and human rights abuses of the Iranian Islamic Revolution, that unfortunately continues to this day. ( )

Easy to read book about a Christian girl jailed in Tehran in the 80's during the exile and death of the Shah of Iran. Just a glimpse at the atrocities toward women during the beginning of the Ayatollah Khomeini's regime. ( )