This summer me and my family went to Turkey on holiday for the third time in a row. Yeah, I guess you could say that we are in love with the country! Me especially! I have grown to love the country, the people, the culture, the nature, the history, the language, the religion - everything!
So, it's not surprising at all that the moment I saw this book in my local library, I immediately grabbed it and took it home with me.
At the beginning you can see three covers of the book. The Slovak one, the English one and the Dutch one. The book is originally written in Dutch by Kader Abdolah. However, the author originally comes from Iran but he had to emmigrate to Netherlands.
Anyway, let's get to the actual book! When I read the decsription of the story, it was mainly connected with a revolution in Iran. However, only the last third of the book is directly about the revolution. The two thirds follow the daily life of a family that owns the town biggest mosque but you can sense the preparation for a riot between the lines throughout the whole book.
It is quite difficult to describe the book. I feel like it follows two things. First one would be a life of a family owning the biggest Mosque in Iranian city, Senejan. The other one would be the way the family and the whole city is affected in by the dictatorship and Iranian politicians.
After reading this book you'll understand the life behind a Muslim life a little bit more. It slightly explains why is the religion, culture and everything so important to those people and what it means to be a Muslim.
On the other side, the author shows us the not-so-good political situation in Iran and how bad it is handled because of Iranian politicians who make the country seems in a different, rather bad way.
I believe many people still cannot really understand Islamic culture and religion. After reading this book it feels very natural to behave the way they behave. The author takes us through all the little things! Choosing a husband for a girl, the wedding, the life of the town, the market, the sermons in the mosque which are not always about Allah, the story of men becoming ayatollahs and imams (don't want me to explain it to you because that is for a few more paragraphs!). It shows us loyalty, admiration, betrayal, forgiveness, strength, weakness, desperation and love, of course.
In last chapters you get to the revolution which was tough, violent and bloody. Yet with a happy ending for Muslims even though using word 'happy' after a revolution is a little bit questionable.
I have to say the style Abdolah wrote this book in, is very easy to read and more importantly, it's easy to understand what he's trying to say. And that is always a big plus for a book!
In the end, I can truly say it's worth reading!
My final rating: 5/5
