Bøker av Mehrnaz Massoudi

A daughter never makes it home, but her memory lives on in a garden. A son runs away, leaving his mother with the lessons she hadn't been ready to hear. A woman grieves her lost relationship only to begin a new one with herself on the Camino de Santiago. In this collection of nine short stories, Mehrnaz Massoudi tenderly explores the many layers of grief and rage mothers, daughters, and women around the world face throughout their lifetimes, and the healing that can be found in the most sacred of places-within ourselves.These exquisite short stories take the reader on a rollercoaster ride where the destination is not the happy or sad ending, but the moment the main characters come to terms with their respective realities and traumas, finding places where love and acceptance can flourish, and grief is given space to unfurl.She's Still Here is an evocative, touching portrayal of the human experience, and its resilience in the face of profound suffering, betrayal, regret, and loss. But it is also a beautifully rendered expression of love in all of its forms, but especially the love we should give ourselves.

Both charming and powerful, this memoir unfolds the story of a young girl born in Iran who eventually triumphs over sexism and abuse to become a successful woman and mother in Canada. The book opens with a dramatic account of a terrible accident that leaves a young child with burn scars all over her chest. This scarring has a profound effect on the girl's life. Yet, despite this accident, the narrator's childhood is rich and blessed in many ways. The family circle is extensive and the relationships, especially with the wonderful Baba (her father) and her spirited cousin Fereshteh, are both protective and complex. The narrator travels from Qazvin, an ancient capital of the Persian Empire, to remote mountain villages, to the glittering capital of Tehran with its cafés, dance clubs, fancy boutiques and lush parks, to a villa on the Caspian Sea, as well as to the "tin town" of Halaby Abad in Southern Tehran and to the rice paddies where women do backbreaking work for next to nothing in wages. In doing so, she deftly handles a minefield of politics, from the regime of the Shah to the foreign interests of British and Americans, to street marches and protests, to the installation of the Ayatollah Khomeini and the Islamic Republic. A beloved uncle is murdered by the Revolutionary Guards and the narrator's own marriage to a man of the Bahai faith is illegal. Sexual politics and women's rights are addressed throughout the memoir from the Persian custom of khastegari, to the stripping of women's rights under the Islamic Republic to domestic abuse in Canada.