Iranian American Archives

Top 10 Audiobooks of 2022 [in School Library Journal]

29 Dec, by SIBookDragon in Audio, Black/African American, Children/Picture Books, Chinese American, European, Fiction, Hapa/Mixed-race, Iranian American, Lists, Middle Grade Readers, Nonethnic-specific, Nonfiction, Persian American, Repost, Thai American, Young Adult Readers

Culled from the 200-plus titles with November 2021 to October 2022 publication dates I’ve reviewed or judged, this is SLJ’s list of top 10 audiobooks. Two picture books, a family history in verse, remade fairy tales, an intertwined podcast, and a haven’t-ever-heard-that-before double recording are...

The Chandler Legacies by Abdi Nazemian [in Booklist]

14 Jun, by SIBookDragon in Audio, Fiction, Iranian American, Persian American, Repost, Young Adult Readers

*STARRED REVIEW Vikas Adam, who was one-third of the terrific trio that voiced Abdi Nazemian’s Like a Love Story (2019), returns solo to adroitly cipher the diverse boarding-school cast here (Nazemian closes the recording with his own author’s-note narration). Chandler Academy is tiny enough, but to be...

A Girl Called Rumi by Ari Honarvar [in Shelf Awareness]

04 Oct, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Fiction, Iranian, Iranian American, Persian, Persian American, Repost

Journalist/artist/activist Ari Honarvar's promising debut, A Girl Called Rumi, memorializes the lifesaving power of storytelling through the darkest terrors. In 1981, the Iran-Iraq War was still new and a semblance of normalcy seemed possible for 9-year-old Kimia, who claims "Rumi" as part-time moniker. She's missing...

American Estrangement by Saïd Sayrafiezadeh [in Booklist]

10 Aug, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Fiction, Iranian American, Persian American, Repost, Short Stories

The men, mostly young, in memoirist and playwright Saïd Sayrafiezadeh’s provoking second story collection lack fulfillment. “Workplace lassitude” is suffocating a 19-year-old wannabe actor stuck at his father’s construction company in “Audition,” while an art-gallery employee fights nine hours of daily tedium in “A, S,...

Asian American #OwnVoices: Artfully Narrated Middle Grade, YA, and Crossover Audiobooks [in School Library Journal]

17 May, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Audio, Canadian Asian Pacific American, Chinese American, Fiction, Filipina/o American, Hapa/Mixed-race, Indian American, Iranian American, Japanese American, Korean American, Lists, Memoir, Middle Grade Readers, Nonfiction, Pakistani American, Persian American, Repost, South Asian American, Southeast Asian American, Vietnamese American, Young Adult Readers

Welcome to Asian Pacific American (APA) Heritage Month. The year remains somber, as the APA community combats dramatically increasing anti-Asian violence around the country and continues to mourn the eight people, including six women of Asian descent, killed in a Georgia mass shooting. Despite a U.S....

The Immortals of Tehran by Ali Araghi [in Shelf Awareness]

28 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Fiction, Iranian, Iranian American, Persian, Persian American, Repost

*STARRED REVIEW Ali Araghi begins his prodigious debut novel with a literal bang: once upon a time in an apple orchard, a returning soldier urges his rifle into his son's hands, forcing the boy to shoot him. The shocking tragedy renders 10-year-old Ahmad mute, and has...

Then the Fish Swallowed Him by Amir Ahmadi Arian [in Shelf Awareness}

07 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Fiction, Iranian, Iranian American, Persian, Persian American, Repost

Prolifically published in his native Farsi, Amir Ahmadi Arian makes his English-language debut with Then the Fish Swallowed Him, a disturbingly irresistible novel exposing the invalidity of truth and lies under a despotic regime. Growing up in a volatile, politically fractured society and losing both parents...

Five More to Go: Shokoofeh Azar’s The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree [in The Booklist Reader]

16 Jan, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Fiction, Iranian, Iranian American, Persian, Repost, Translation

The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree by Shokoofeh Azar Although the page facing the title of Azar’s first novel to be translated into English clearly states, “Translated from the Farsi,” the linguistic enabler remains anonymous; the publisher’s official line is, “the translator of this book has asked...

Booklist Backlist: Fictional Worlds, Real Meals [in Booklist]

16 Dec, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, African, Arab, Arab American, Black/African American, Canadian, Cuban, Cuban American, Fiction, Filipina/o American, Iranian, Iranian American, Japanese, Korean, Latina/o/x, Lebanese, Lebanese American, Lists, Nonethnic-specific, Persian, Persian American, Repost, Southeast Asian American, Translation, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American

Yeah, sure: Proust and his madeleine-dipped-in-tea set the barometer for toothsome leitmotifs. I admit to the possibility that my academic indoctrination in his long, long musings made me quite the hungry reader. Or maybe I’m just always greedy for nourishment, with preferences in the belly...

The Stationery Shop by Marjan Kamali [in Booklist]

04 Nov, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Iranian, Iranian American, Persian, Persian American, Repost

*STARRED REVIEW Adroitly adapting her deep, mellifluous voice across continents, decades, ages, and genders, Mozhan Marnò flawlessly embodies Marjan Kamali’s (Together Tea, 2013) stupendous sophomore title about young lovers torn apart by class, politics, and history during the violent tumult of 1950s Iran. A Tehran stationery...

My Grandma and Me by Mina Javaherbin, illustrated by Lindsey Yankey [in Shelf Awareness]

21 Aug, by SIBookDragon in Children/Picture Books, Fiction, Iranian, Iranian American, Memoir, Repost

*STARRED REVIEW For a little girl growing up in Iran, her grandmother is her beloved conduit to the rest of the world. "I followed her everywhere," she explains. "When she swept, I swept. When she cooked, I cooked. When she prayed, I prayed like her, too."...

13 Fall Faves, Speed-Dating Style [in The Booklist Reader]

03 Jul, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, African, Black/African American, Caribbean American, Cuban, Cuban American, Fiction, Indian American, Iranian, Iranian American, Japanese, Korean, Latina/o/x, Lists, Memoir, Nonfiction, Persian American, Repost, Short Stories, South Asian, South Asian American, Translation, Turkish, Vietnamese American, Young Adult Readers

Oh, good gracious! I can’t stand it: soooo many amazing books and my aging eyeballs just can’t keep up! Last week at ALA Annual, I got to “Read ‘n’ Rave,” but I had such an embarrassingly overflowing list, the buzzer went off (uh-oh!), and I couldn’t...

Audio Picks for Asian Pacific American Heritage Month [in School Library Journal]

08 May, by SIBookDragon in Audio, Chinese American, Fiction, Filipina/o, Filipina/o American, Hapa/Mixed-race, Indian, Indian American, Iranian, Iranian American, Korean American, Lists, Middle Grade Readers, Persian, Persian American, Repost, Short Stories, South Asian, South Asian American, Taiwanese American, Young Adult Readers

May is Asian Pacific American (APA) Heritage Month. Why May? The first Japanese people immigrated to the United States on May 7, 1843, and the transcontinental railroad – built mostly with immigrant Chinese labor – was completed on May 10, 1869. In 1977, Congressional legislation...

Have Audiobook, Will Travel [in School Library Journal]

01 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Audio, Black/African American, Chinese American, European, Fiction, Hapa/Mixed-race, Indian American, Iranian American, Jewish, Korean American, Latin American, Latina/o/x, Lists, Middle Grade Readers, Nonethnic-specific, Persian American, Repost, South Asian American, Young Adult Readers

The luggage is loaded, and the gas tank is full. Destination’s mapped. Ready to go? Press play! MIDDLE GRADE Flying Lessons and Other Stories edited by Ellen Oh, read by full cast Some of the most beloved, lauded, and awarded children’s authors – including Matt de la Peña,...

Darius the Great Is Not Okay by Adib Khorram [in Booklist]

08 Feb, by SIBookDragon in Audio, Fiction, Hapa/Mixed-race, Iranian, Iranian American, Persian, Persian American, Repost, Young Adult Readers

Sixteen-year-old loner Darius Kellner is an easy target at his Portland, Oregon, high school. He’s clinically depressed, a diagnosis he shares with his “Teutonic Übermensch” father. His nurturing comes mostly from his Iranian immigrant mother, and he’s close to his 8-year-old sister. For all that,...

A Very Large Expanse of Sea by Tahereh Mafi [in Booklist]

17 Jan, by SIBookDragon in Audio, Fiction, Iranian American, Persian, Persian American, Repost, Young Adult Readers

*STARRED REVIEW Already a best-selling fantasy YA author (the Shatter Me series), Tahereh Mafi firmly roots herself in familiar reality with her latest, a can’t-turn-away timely story about teens falling in love despite intolerant peer pressure, difficult family situations, and vast cultural divides. Sixteen-year-old Shirin has switched...

Song of a Captive Bird by Jasmin Darznik [in Library Journal]

24 May, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Iranian, Iranian American, Persian, Persian American, Repost

*STARRED REVIEW With her eloquent contralto, Mozhan Marnò exquisitely embodies the Persian poet and filmmaker Forugh Farrokhzad – her experiences as a young bride, maturation as a writer, hesitant then strident steps toward independence, and refusal to be silenced through the violent horrors of the autocratic...

The Last Days of Café Leila by Donia Bijan + Author Interview [in Bloom]

01 Nov, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Fiction, Iranian, Iranian American, Persian, Persian American, Repost

Café Leila & Beautiful Ruins: Q&A with Donia Bijan “Strange things happened when I returned to Tehran in 2010 after thirty-two years in exile,” writes Donia Bijan in her recent essay, “The Women’s Hour.” Traveling with her sister, she found her childhood home – the hospital their father built...

Refuge by Dina Nayeri [in Christian Science Monitor]

27 Jul, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, European, Fiction, Iranian, Iranian American, Persian, Persian American, Repost

'Refuge' is the story of an Iranian family in search of home Here’s the seemingly simple narrative frame: A father and daughter are separated and spend the next two decades both avoiding and yearning for reconnection. But Dina Nayeri’s sophomore novel, Refuge, is anything but straightforward,...

The Refugee Experience for Middle Grade and YA Readers [in The Booklist Reader]

13 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Afghan, African, Arab, Biography, Canadian, Canadian Asian Pacific American, Caribbean, Cuban, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Iranian, Iranian American, Iraqi, Italian, Lists, Memoir, Middle Eastern, Middle Grade Readers, Myanmarese (Burmese), Nonethnic-specific, Nonfiction, Poetry, Repost, Verse Novel/Nonfiction, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American, Young Adult Readers

This is the second in a two-part series of recommended books for youth about the refugee experience. For a list of picture books, click here. Canada, with her groovin' President, functional healthcare system, and more welcoming borders, is currently in the throes of "Month 13," the first month following...

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