The best books about Iran

Who picked these books? Meet our 100 experts.

100 authors created a book list connected to Iran, and here are their favorite Iran books.
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Cannabis

By Lucas Richert (editor), Jim Mills (editor),

Book cover of Cannabis: Global Histories

Chris S. Duvall Author Of The African Roots of Marijuana

From the list on the history of cannabis.

Who am I?

I study people-plant relationships from perspectives including ecology, history, cultural studies, and biogeography. Cannabis is certainly the most famous plant I’ve studied. A decade ago I was researching how Africans used an obscure tree in historical Central America, and came across accounts of cannabis use that surprised me. As I dug into cannabis history, I was continually amazed at how little the topic has been researched. It’s a great time to start learning about the plant’s past, because it’s a fresh, new field for professional academics. Cannabis has been portrayed so simplistically for decades, but in reality it’s a complex plant with a complicated history.

Chris' book list on the history of cannabis

Discover why each book is one of Chris' favorite books.

Why did Chris love this book?

Although this book is written by and for professional historians, it’s really accessible and provides a great geographic range of chapter-length cases of the plant’s past. This book is where to go for a sound knowledge of the plant’s worldwide past. The chapters cover places and times ranging from 19th-century France to apartheid-era South Africa and post-revolutionary Iran—and many of the studies aren’t published elsewhere.

By Lucas Richert (editor), Jim Mills (editor),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Cannabis as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Cannabis consumption, commerce, and control in global history, from the nineteenth century to the present day.

This book gathers together authors from the new wave of cannabis histories that has emerged in recent decades. It offers case studies from Africa, Asia, the Americas, Europe, and the Middle East. It does so to trace a global history of the plant and its preparations, arguing that Western colonialism shaped and disseminated ideas in the nineteenth century that came to drive the international control regimes of the twentieth.

More recently, the emergence of commercial interests in cannabis has been central to the challenges…


Days of Revolution

By Mary Elaine Hegland,

Book cover of Days of Revolution: Political Unrest in an Iranian Village

Eric Lob Author Of Iran's Reconstruction Jihad: Rural Development and Regime Consolidation after 1979

From the list on Iranian history, politics, and culture.

Who am I?

I am a professor of politics and international relations with a focus on Iran. My passion for the country started while studying Persian or Farsi with an exceptional professor in graduate school. During that time, I had the privilege of traveling to Iran three times to study the language and conduct research on rural politics. This period coincided with the Green Movement uprising, a pivotal moment in the country. Since then, I have been enthralled by Iranian history, politics, and culture. Their richness and complexity make it a subject that can be studied and appreciated for a lifetime.              

Eric's book list on Iranian history, politics, and culture

Discover why each book is one of Eric's favorite books.

Why did Eric love this book?

This book was written by one of the few Americans, who lived in Iran during the revolution, and helped inspire and inform my own monograph on the rural politics of the country. Based on years of painstaking ethnographic fieldwork and in-depth interviews, this anthropological work traces the sociopolitical transformations that transpired in an Iranian village located outside the city of Shiraz before and after the Iranian Revolution. The book demonstrates the increasingly blurry boundaries between rural and urban geographies and identities as the country modernized, and the opportunities and challenges behind this process. While previous scholarship contends that villagers refrained from supporting or participating in the revolution, this book paints a more nuanced and complex picture by showing that some in fact did while others did not and explains why this was the case.   

By Mary Elaine Hegland,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Days of Revolution as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Outside of Shiraz in the Fars Province of southwestern Iran lies "Aliabad." Mary Hegland arrived in this then-small agricultural village of several thousand people in the summer of 1978, unaware of the momentous changes that would sweep this town and this country in the months ahead. She became the only American researcher to witness the Islamic Revolution firsthand over her eighteen-month stay. Days of Revolution offers an insider's view of how regular people were drawn into, experienced, and influenced the 1979 Revolution and its aftermath.

Conventional wisdom assumes Shi'a religious ideology fueled the revolutionary movement. But Hegland counters that the…


Song of a Captive Bird

By Jasmin Darznik,

Book cover of Song of a Captive Bird

Catori Sarmiento Author Of When We Were Flowers

From the list on diversity in womanhood.

Who am I?

I’ve always been interested in the interconnected lives of women and of womanhood. I find that it's also important to acknowledge the diversity in women’s experiences in all cultures and points in history. My first academic essay, which was published, was “Reevaluating of the Role of Women in Beowulf” which, in my youth, helped to not only flesh out the historical and contemporary roles women or persons who identify as women have had but also to begin to understand what that means to myself and to those around me. Since then, when writing about women in my numerous stories and novels, I focus on how she exists within her world and how she defines herself.

Catori's book list on diversity in womanhood

Discover why each book is one of Catori's favorite books.

Why did Catori love this book?

I enjoyed the presentation of the historical and biographical point of view in this book which follows Forough Farrokhzad from a forced marriage to her life as a poet and filmmaker. The poetry from Forough Farrokhzad itself is used to give insight into her thoughts and desires. Her poem "Sin" was one that I read and re-read at different points during the book because of how it intertwined with the narrative. 

By Jasmin Darznik,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Song of a Captive Bird as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

LOS ANGELES TIMES BESTSELLER • A spellbinding debut novel about the trailblazing Iranian poet Forugh Farrokhzad, who defied society’s expectations to find her voice and her destiny

“A complex and beautiful rendering of [a] vanished country and its scattered people, a reminder of the power and purpose of art, and an ode to female creativity under a patriarchy that repeatedly tries to snuff it out.”—The New York Times Book Review (Editors’ Choice)

All through her childhood in Tehran, Forugh Farrokhzad is told that Persian daughters should be quiet and modest. She is taught only to obey, but she always finds…


Book cover of The Rise and Fall of OPEC in the Twentieth Century

Robert Vitalis Author Of Oilcraft: The Myths of Scarcity and Security That Haunt U.S. Energy Policy

From the list on crazy things we believe on oil and world politics.

Who am I?

I have been fascinated with the relationship between the United States and the Middle East since my freshman year at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, where I began as a commuter, stuck in gasoline lines, during the “energy crisis” in the fall of 1973, and where I was among the first SUNY students to study abroad in Egypt after the United States resumed diplomatic relations. I wrote my dissertation on Egypt’s economic development (When Capitalists Collide: Business Conflict and the End of Empire in Egypt, 1995) and have been teaching and writing about U.S. involvement in the region for 35 years.

Robert's book list on crazy things we believe on oil and world politics

Discover why each book is one of Robert's favorite books.

Why did Robert love this book?

Professor Garavini, who teaches at Roma Tre University in Italy, has written a game-changer of a book on the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, one that reorients our view away from the overblown accounts of oil-weapon-wielding sovereigns holding the West hostage. If you believe that OPEC is a cartel or that it embargoed the United States and reduced oil supplies to the world in 1973, this book will set you straight.

By Giuliano Garavini,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Rise and Fall of OPEC in the Twentieth Century as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) is one of the most recognizable acronyms among international organizations. It is mainly associated with the 'oil shock' of 1973 when prices of petroleum quadrupled and industrialized countries and consumers were forced to face the limits of their development model.

This is the first history of OPEC and of its members written by a professional historian. It carries the reader from the formation of the first petrostate in the world, Venezuela in the late 1920s, to the global ascent of petrostates and OPEC during the 1970s, to their crisis in the late-1980s…


Daughter of Persia

By Sattareh Farman Farmaian, Dona Munker,

Book cover of Daughter of Persia: A Woman's Journey from Her Father's Harem Through the Islamic Revolution

Lois Pryce Author Of Revolutionary Ride: On the Road to Shiraz, the Heart of Iran

From the list on understanding modern Iran.

Who am I?

Lois Pryce is a British author who has travelled extensively in Iran. Her book, Revolutionary Ride tells the story of her 2013 solo motorcycle tour of the country and was shortlisted for the Edward Stanford ‘Adventure Book of the Year’ Award. Her travels have taken her to over fifty countries and her writing has featured in The New York Times, The Guardian, CNN, BBC, The Telegraph and The Independent.

Lois' book list on understanding modern Iran

Discover why each book is one of Lois' favorite books.

Why did Lois love this book?

An astounding 20th century life-story told with honesty and warmth by one of Iran’s most impressive and pioneering women. From growing up as part of her father’s harem before setting sail for the USA during WWII to attend university, then returning to Iran to create a national social care system and finally, the unbearable tragedy of her life’s work being destroyed by the Islamic regime, this is an inspiring but heartbreaking story of bravery and humanity at its best.

By Sattareh Farman Farmaian, Dona Munker,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Daughter of Persia as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Sattareh Farman Farmaian, the daughter of a once-powerful and wealthy Iranian prince, was raised and educated in the 1920s and 1930s in a Persian harem compound, along with numerous mothers and more than 30 brothers and sisters. As a young woman, she broke with Muslim tradition and travelled to America, where she became the first Persian to study at the University of Southern California. Her new life in the West fired a vision to lift her own people out of backwardness and poverty, and she returned to Iran to found the Tehran School of Social Work. For more than 20…


The Handler

By M. P. Woodward,

Book cover of The Handler

James E. Mack Author Of Asset Seven

From the list on spy reads by real life spies.

Who am I?

I spent over two decades on the front lines of counterterrorism and counterinsurgency, working for many organisations and agencies around the globe. Having survived shootings, bombings, double agents, and kidnap attempts, I now prefer to write about such things rather than experience them! I grew up reading spy thrillers from the likes of Gerald Seymour and Frederick Forsyth and retain a passion for the genre. And there’s nothing better than reading a new novel, getting lost in the plot, and appreciating the realism or authenticity the author brings to the story. I hope you enjoy the books I’ve recommended that were written by real-life spies.

James' book list on spy reads by real life spies

Discover why each book is one of James' favorite books.

Why did James love this book?

Another experienced intelligence officer, M.P. Woodward has created a terrific cast of characters for his series that begins with The Handler.

Once again, there’s a healthy dose of authenticity drawn from Woodward’s background that helps drive the plot forward.

A CIA operative, Meredith Morris-Dale, is assigned to extract an Iranian nuclear scientist with vital intelligence. The scientist, however, will only agree to the extraction if Meredith's ex-husband and former disgraced CIA paramilitary, John, carries out the operation.

Throw in internal CIA politics, Russian and Iranian spies, and the strained relationship of the divorced couple now working together and you have a terrific plot that races along.

By M. P. Woodward,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Handler as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A disgraced former CIA operative must go back in the field with only his ex-wife as his handler in this electrifying thriller from a former intelligence officer.

Meredith Morris-Dale is a CIA case officer and a damn good one...even if this last mission did go terribly wrong. Now she has been summoned back to Langley where she expects to be fired. Instead, she is met by the Deputy Director with stunning news. 

A single well-placed CIA mole in Iran’s uranium enrichment program has kept the terrorist nation from building a bomb by sabotaging the performance of their covert centrifuge arrays.…


It Ain't So Awful, Falafel

By Firoozeh Dumas,

Book cover of It Ain't So Awful, Falafel

Shanah Khubiar Author Of Just a Hat

From the list on Persians and Jews coming of age in America.

Who am I?

I’ve always loved to read, but on the other hand, there are few good books by and about Persian Americans. I took it upon myself to begin writing fiction about the Persian-Jewish American experience to preserve a limited historical window that is almost closed. As a third-generation Persian-American, I want readers to enjoy the transition story of an elegant, humorous, and diligent people. I continue to gobble up the literature of the Persian Americans, whether Christian, Muslim, or Jewish. I haven’t run across any works from a Zoroastrian yet, but I’m hoping to!

Shanah's book list on Persians and Jews coming of age in America

Discover why each book is one of Shanah's favorite books.

Why did Shanah love this book?

Firoozeh Dumas’ humor is so natural that it’s effortless on the page. Many immigrant stories are so dark as to simply become glorified moralizing, but here is a genuinely interesting and fun story that teaches a lesson without being so heavy-handed that it’s little more than a treatise.

I identified with Zomorod’s (“Cindy’s”) new kid on the block in California experience. Likewise, I was a nerd who had to move often, so it wasn’t always easy to make new friends, especially when it was the odd ones who were willing to take on the new kid! 

Parents complicated the situation as well, so seeing how Zomorod navigated during the difficult time of the Iran hostage crisis was personally encouraging. I guess all kids worry that they are weird and one mistake away from shunning, so in that respect, Dumas’ story should appeal to all kinds of kids, not just Persian-Americans. 

By Firoozeh Dumas,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked It Ain't So Awful, Falafel as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Zomorod (Cindy) Yousefzadeh is the new kid on the block . . . for the fourth time. California's Newport Beach is her family's latest perch, and she's determined to shuck her brainy loner persona and start afresh with a new Brady Bunch name-Cindy. It's the late 1970s, and fitting in becomes more difficult as Iran makes U.S. headlines with protests, revolution, and finally the taking of American hostages. Even puka shell necklaces, pool parties, and flying fish can't distract Cindy from the anti-Iran sentiments that creep way too close to home. A poignant yet lighthearted middle grade debut from the…


Book cover of The Ayatollah Begs to Differ: The Paradox of Modern Iran

Dora Levy Mossanen Author Of Harem

From the list on Persian history and its people.

Who am I?

I was born in Israel, but spent my formative years in Iran, a country rich in culture, superstition, and a history that is nothing short of an author’s dream. I also joined a large, colorful family, whose members possessed their own quirks and habits, which my future fictional characters inherited in one or another of my novels. Although the Iran I knew during the reign of the Shah was quite different than the Iran I had to flee at the onset of the Islamic revolution and the arrival of Ayatollah Khomeini, her history remains ever timely, and never ceases to captivate me.

Dora's book list on Persian history and its people

Discover why each book is one of Dora's favorite books.

Why did Dora love this book?

The grandson of an eminent ayatollah and the son of an Iranian diplomat, Hooman Majd offers perspective on Iran's complex and misunderstood culture through an insightful tour of Iranian culture, introducing fascinating characters from all walks of life, including zealous government officials, tough female cab drivers, and open-minded, reformist ayatollahs. It's an Iran that will surprise readers and challenge Western stereotypes.

By Hooman Majd,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Ayatollah Begs to Differ as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Hooman Majd, acclaimed journalist and New York-residing grandson of an Ayatollah, has a unique perspective on his Iranian homeland. In this vivid, warm and humorous insider's account, he opens our eyes to an Iran that few people see, meeting opium-smoking clerics, women cab drivers and sartorially challenged presidential officials, among others.

Revealing a country where both t-shirt wearing teenagers and religious martyrs express pride in their Persian origins, that is deeply religious yet highly cosmopolitan, authoritarian yet reformist, this is the one book you should read to understand Iran and Iranians today.


Iran Awakening

By Shirin Ebadi, Azadeh Moaveni,

Book cover of Iran Awakening: One Woman's Journey to Reclaim Her Life and Country

Robin Kirk Author Of Righting Wrongs: 20 Human Rights Heroes Around the World

From the list on women human rights visionaries.

Who am I?

I’ve been a rights advocate since I was a middle schooler planning how to help save the whales. In college, I volunteered in anti-apartheid campaigns, then became a journalist covering the rise of the Shining Path guerrillas in Peru. I wanted my research and words to make change. I spent 12 years covering Peru and Colombia for Human Rights Watch. Now, I try to inspire other young people to learn about and advocate for human rights as a professor and the co-director of the Duke Human Rights Center at the Franklin Humanities Institute. I also write fiction for kids that explores human rights themes and just completed The Bond Trilogy, an epic fantasy.

Robin's book list on women human rights visionaries

Discover why each book is one of Robin's favorite books.

Why did Robin love this book?

In 2003, Ebadi was the first Muslim woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize for her pioneering advocacy for human rights, including in her native Iran. I love her voice in this memoir: perceptive, funny, and very serious when it comes to making the case that human rights can flourish within Islam. You can feel both her passion and her bravery against the crushing authoritarianism that continues to strangle this vibrant country and culture. She also makes the case that the women of Iran will be the ones who finally prevail in the struggle for human rights. 

By Shirin Ebadi, Azadeh Moaveni,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Iran Awakening as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In this remarkable book, Shirin Ebadi, Iranian human rights lawyer and activist, and Nobel Peace Prize laureate, tells her extraordinary life story.

Dr Ebadi is a tireless voice for reform in her native Iran, where she argues for a new interpretation of Sharia law in harmony with vital human rights such as democracy, equality before the law, religious freedom and freedom of speech. She is known for defending dissident figures, and for the establishment of a number of non-profit grassroots organisations dedicated to human rights. In 2003 she became the first Muslim woman, and the first Iranian, to be awarded…


Book cover of The New Book of Middle Eastern Food

Mary Taylor Simeti Author Of Sicilian Summer: An Adventure in Cooking with my Grandsons

From the list on food catering to the plate, the eye, and the mind.

Who am I?

As an American living and cooking in Sicily for almost sixty years, I have soaked up Sicilian cuisine and culture both through research and by osmosis, delighting in discovering how the food I was preparing reflected the island’s position in history and geography, a meeting point for almost all the civilizations of the Mediterranean. My first book, a memoir of my life here entitled On Persephone’s Island, was followed by Pomp and Sustenance. Twenty-five Centuries of Sicilian Food, the first book on Sicilian cuisine to be published in English. Six more books on different aspects of Sicilian food and culture, in English or in Italian, have followed.

Mary's book list on food catering to the plate, the eye, and the mind

Discover why each book is one of Mary's favorite books.

Why did Mary love this book?

Sixty years ago when I first started cooking in Sicily, local ingredients were of topnotch quality but very limited variety, so my American cookbooks and food mags were useless. The discovery of Claudia Roden’s book opened up a whole new world: recipe upon recipe with Mediterranean ingredients and delicious results, and fascinating notes on the origin of the dishes, notes that made me want to know more about culinary history.

By Claudia Roden,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The New Book of Middle Eastern Food as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Claudia Roden's A Book of Middle Eastern Food is your ultimate cookbook and guide to the rich and exotic recipes of the Middle East . . .

'Meticulously collected, compellingly assembled, lovingly told . . . Informative, delectable and incredibly useful' YOTAM OTTOLENGHI

'Roden's great gift is to conjure up not just a cuisine but the culture from which it springs' NIGELLA LAWSON
_______

When it first published, Claudia Roden's bestselling classic Book of Middle Eastern Food revolutionised Western attitudes to the cuisines of the Middle East.

Containing over 500 modern and accessible recipes that are brought to life with…


Book cover of A Thousand Sighs, a Thousand Revolts: Journeys in Kurdistan

Alesa Lightbourne Author Of The Kurdish Bike

From the list on the Kurds and their world.

Who am I?

Like the main character in my book, I went to Kurdish Iraq as a well-meaning (but admittedly naive) teacher, and fell in love with the Kurdish people and their culture. To be more specific, it was village women I really bonded with. Listening to their stories, and watching them try to cope with so many practical restrictions, tore at my heart. Part of me wanted to “liberate” them from the seemingly outdated traditions that held them back. Simultaneously, I couldn’t help but envy them for the solaces their tight community offered them -- and which Western society denied me. Rather than claiming to be an expert on Kurds, I am now someone who studies them with the greatest respect. The humble Kurdish villagers gave me moral examples that I wish every Westerner could be fortunate enough to have.

Alesa's book list on the Kurds and their world

Discover why each book is one of Alesa's favorite books.

Why did Alesa love this book?

History, culture, politics, plus the zing of real personalities. This book has it all, presented by a gutsy but sensitive journalist. Bird traveled through the four nations that are home to Kurds -- Iraq, Iran, Syria, and Turkey -- in 2003. Although a lot has changed since then, her book remains the gold standard for nonfiction about these fascinating and little-understood people. You’ll wish you could have stowed away in her backpack.

By Christiane Bird,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked A Thousand Sighs, a Thousand Revolts as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Though the Kurds played a major military and tactical role in the United States’ recent war with Iraq, most of us know little about this fiercely independent, long-marginalized people. Now acclaimed journalist Christiane Bird, who riveted readers with her tour of Islamic Iran in Neither East Nor West, travels through this volatile part of the world to tell the Kurds’ story, using personal observations and in-depth research to illuminate an astonishing history and vibrant culture.

For the twenty-five to thirty million Kurds, Kurdistan is both an actual and a mythical place: an isolated, largely mountainous homeland that has historically offered…


The Kurdish Spring

By David L. Phillips,

Book cover of The Kurdish Spring: A New Map of the Middle East

Janet Biehl Author Of Ecology or Catastrophe: The Life of Murray Bookchin

From the list on Rojava (Kurdish region of Syria).

Who am I?

I was the partner and late-life collaborator of the late social ecology theorist Murray Bookchin. Shortly before his death his 2006, the Kurdish freedom movement took up his ideas, as Abdullah Öcalan, the PKK’s thought leader, had recommended them. Öcalan created a new ideology based in part on social ecology, promoting face-to-face democracy through citizen assemblies and councils; the liberation of women; a cooperative economy; and an ecological orientation. In several northern provinces of Syria, activist Kurds started building liberatory institutions based on these ideas, at first illicitly, under the Assad regime’s brutal persecution. Then a few years later, after the Syrian civil war erupted in 2011, the northern provinces declined to take sides in the conflict but instead created a revolution, turning the democratic, gender-equal institutions they had been building into the polity of self-governing provinces, known as Rojava (now known as the Democratic Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria). As a result of my connection with Bookchin, I was privileged to visit three times and witnessed the revolution.

Janet's book list on Rojava (Kurdish region of Syria)

Discover why each book is one of Janet's favorite books.

Why did Janet love this book?

After World War I, the great powers who carved up the Middle East should have by all rights given the huge population of Kurds there a state of their own. But the new Turkish republic made sure they didn’t, and as a result of this historic betrayal, Kurdish people have lived as a minority in several Middle Eastern countries, whose dictatorial governments persecuted them brutally and often still do. Phillips, a longtime champion of Kurdish human rights, surveys their condition and traces their current evolution into a vibrant political community, arguing for international recognition of their right to self-determination.

By David L. Phillips,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Kurdish Spring as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Kurds are the largest stateless people in the world. An estimated thirty-two million Kurds live in "Kurdistan," which includes parts of Turkey, Iraq, Syria, and Iran-today's "hot spots" in the Middle East. The Kurdish Spring explores the subjugation of Kurds by Arab, Ottoman, and Persian powers for almost a century, and explains why Kurds are now evolving from a victimized people to a coherent political community.

David L. Phillips describes Kurdish rebellions and arbitrary divisions in the last century, chronicling the nadir of Kurdish experience in the 1980s. He discusses draconian measures implemented by Iraq, including use of chemical weapons,…


Behind Putin's Curtain

By Stephan Orth,

Book cover of Behind Putin's Curtain: Friendships and Misadventures Inside Russia

Lisa Dickey Author Of Bears in the Streets: Three Journeys Across a Changing Russia

From the list on the Russian people.

Who am I?

Lisa Dickey is an author and book collaborator who’s helped write 20+ nonfiction books, including 10 New York Times Best Sellers. She’s also a Russophile from way back:  her first post-college job was working as a nanny at the U.S. embassy in Moscow during the last days of the Soviet Union. Lisa began her writing career in St. Petersburg in the mid-1990s, writing for the Moscow Times and USA Today, and she’s the author of Bears in the Streets: Three Journeys Across a Changing Russia.

Lisa's book list on the Russian people

Discover why each book is one of Lisa's favorite books.

Why did Lisa love this book?

Stephan Orth has a lot of nerve. The author of Couchsurfing in Iran, he decides to take his talents to Russia, stopping in places no tourist would dare to go and getting to know actual Russian people. And then he writes a funny, insightful, mind-bendingly entertaining book about them. Who does this guy think he is? Do yourself a favor: Read his book and find out. Stephan is a fabulous tour guide of the real Russia and its people.

By Stephan Orth,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Behind Putin's Curtain as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

"Journalist Orth delivers a jaunty description of his travels...[that] armchair travelers will enjoy."
-Publishers Weekly

"Funny, insightful, and mind-bendingly entertaining. Stephan Orth is a fearless and fabulous tour guide to the real Russia and its people."
-Lisa Dickey, author of Bears in the Streets: Three Journeys across a Changing Russia


Book cover of Darius the Great Is Not Okay

Sandra L. Rostirolla Author Of Making Friends With Monsters

From the list on what life is like living with mental illness.

Who am I?

My father died by suicide when I was thirteen. Because my family never spoke about the issues leading up to and resulting from this devastating event, we suffered a great deal. I have a deep love for books that expose just how dark, and troubled the teen existence can be. Authors who are brave enough to tackle such topics feed my bravery. The more stories we have on the topics of suicide, mental health, and trauma the broader the conversation and the more those who feel as though no one could possibly understand what they are going through feel seen.

Sandra's book list on what life is like living with mental illness

Discover why each book is one of Sandra's favorite books.

Why did Sandra love this book?

Right off the bat, Darius jumps off the page as a real teen with relatable problems.

He’s the quiet kid at school, who the others tease. And he suffers from clinical depression. What I loved was how well Khorram tackled depression’s subtleties.

I think there is a tendency for society to see depression as this overarching dark cloud that keeps us in bed 24/7. But the truth is, many people who are suffering, are functional.

From the outside, we don’t see the building up of little moments that act like a snowball gradually expanding as it rolls down the mountain face.

Be warned – the food descriptions are amazing, so you might get hungry during the read.

By Adib Khorram,

Why should I read it?

9 authors picked Darius the Great Is Not Okay as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Darius Kellner speaks better Klingon than Farsi, and he knows more about Hobbit social cues than Persian ones. He's a Fractional Persian - half, his mum's side - and his first-ever trip to Iran is about to change his life. Darius has never really fit in at home, and he's sure things are going to be the same in Iran. His clinical depression doesn't exactly help matters, and trying to explain his medication to his grandparents only makes things harder. Then Darius meets Sohrab, the boy next door, and everything changes. Soon, they're spending their days together, playing soccer, eating…


Book cover of Eastern Sun, Winter Moon: An Autobiographical Odyssey

Ronnie Blair Author Of Eisenhower Babies: Growing Up on Moonshots, Comic Books, and Black-and-White TV

From the list on evoking the magic (and miseries) of childhood.

Who am I?

Growing up in a Kentucky coal-mining community, I enjoyed reading about the lives of other people and how their experiences differed from mine. I read biographies of famous people, such as Paul Revere or Stephen Foster, and an occasional memoir, such as Harlan Ellison writing about infiltrating a juvenile gang or David Gerrold revealing how he came to write for Star Trek. Fiction also took me to places that I had never seen. But something about a coming-of-age tale especially resonated with me and I hope these recommendations will help you make that same connection with how others have navigated the magic and miseries of childhood. 

Ronnie's book list on evoking the magic (and miseries) of childhood

Discover why each book is one of Ronnie's favorite books.

Why did Ronnie love this book?

Gary Paulsen is best known for his novels for young people, such as the popular Hatchet, but this R-rated memoir is aimed at an adult audience. Of my five recommendations, this one is far and away the most representative of the miseries of a dysfunctional childhood. Paulsen’s parents were both alcoholics, and his mother had affairs that she could have done a much better job of hiding from her young son. Somehow, despite the trauma (or maybe because of it), Paulsen emerged as a successful and extraordinarily prolific writer. For those of us with wonderful childhood memories, this book serves as a reminder that not everyone is so lucky.

By Gary Paulsen,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Eastern Sun, Winter Moon as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This work describes the author's experiences as a child during World War II. Along with his mother, who is alternatively protective and selfishly neglectful, Paulsen travelled to the Philippines to live with his father, a distant and imperious army officer.


The Persian Empire

By Amélie Kuhrt,

Book cover of The Persian Empire: A Corpus of Sources from the Achaemenid Period

John O. Hyland Author Of Persian Interventions: The Achaemenid Empire, Athens, and Sparta, 450−386 BCE

From the list on Achaemenid Persia and its Greek neighbors.

Who am I?

I’ve been fascinated with ancient history since childhood, but really fell in love with the Achaemenids in college while taking classes on Greek history and wondering about the other side’s perspective on familiar stories of the Persian Wars. I was fortunate to get the opportunity to study both Greek and Persian history in graduate school at the University of Chicago, a leading center of scholarship on the Achaemenid world since the Persepolis excavations in the 1930s. Since 2006, I’ve taught in the History department at Christopher Newport University, a liberal arts university in Newport News, Virginia. I’m currently working on my next book, a new history of Persia’s Greek campaigns. 

John's book list on Achaemenid Persia and its Greek neighbors

Discover why each book is one of John's favorite books.

Why did John love this book?

The Persian empire’s size and diversity impose special challenges for modern study. The major sources are written in a wide variety of ancient languages, including Old Persian, Elamite, Babylonian, Aramaic, Biblical Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, and many texts were initially studied in specialist publications with limited accessibility outside a small circle of scholars. Kuhrt’s sourcebook did a tremendous service to scholars and students alike by gathering reliable translations of a wide range of written evidence from the Persian empire, replete with supporting notes and bibliography for further reading. It includes substantial selections from Greek historians of Persia, including Herodotus, Xenophon, and the Alexander biographers, but ensures that readers are able to contextualize these texts alongside internal materials reflecting the full diversity of Persian empire and society. 

By Amélie Kuhrt,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Persian Empire as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Bringing together a wide variety of material in many different languages that exists from the substantial body of work left by this large empire, The Persian Empire presents annotated translations, together with introductions to the problems of using it in order to gain an understanding of the history and working os this remarkable political entity.

The Achaemenid empire developed in the region of modern Fars (Islam) and expanded to unite territories stretching from the Segean and Egypt in the west to Central Asia and north-west India, which it ruled for over 200 years until its conquest by Alexander of Macedon.…


Children of the Jinn

By Margaret Kahn,

Book cover of Children of the Jinn: The Story of My Search for the Kurds and Their Country

Christiane Bird Author Of A Thousand Sighs, a Thousand Revolts: Journeys in Kurdistan

From the list on classics about the world of the Kurds.

Who am I?

I first became interested in the Kurds during a 1998 journey I took to Iran to work on my first book about the Middle East, Neither East nor West. While there, I traveled to Sanandaj, Iran’s unofficial Kurdish capital, where I was immediately struck by how different the area seemed from the rest of the Islamic Republic—heartbreaking in its lonesome beauty, and defiant. Despite a large number of Revolutionary Guards on the streets, the men swaggered and women strode. These people are not cowed, I thought—no wonder they make the Islamic government nervous. I had to find out more.

Christiane's book list on classics about the world of the Kurds

Discover why each book is one of Christiane's favorite books.

Why did Christiane love this book?

Five years before Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, Kahn traveled to northwest Iran to study the Kurdish language and teach English. Because Kurdish was outlawed at that time, she endured much suspicion and endless stonewalling before finally being welcomed into Kurdish homes. The result is this moving and groundbreaking work that in a sense paved the way for other travelogues about Kurdistan, including my own. Kahn writes beautifully about the Kurdish women she meets, the difficulties of understanding another culture, and the constant threats of living under SAVAK (then Iran’s secret police).

By Margaret Kahn,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Children of the Jinn as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Forty years after the publication of Margaret Kahn's book, Children of the Jinn, Kurds, the fourth largest linguistic and ethnic group of the Middle East, are still being denied basic human rights. The book is an historical and ethnographic account of the lives and struggles of the individuals she met during the year Iraqi Kurds rose up, with American backing, to wrest their rights from the Ba'athist regime. In the Iranian border town where she lived, she witnessed the arrival of a hundred thousand refugees. She volunteered in the refugee school and saw first-hand what happened when the U.S. government…


Book cover of Heirs to Forgotten Kingdoms: Journeys Into the Disappearing Religions of the Middle East

Zachary Wingerd Author Of Syria Crucified: Stories of Modern Martyrdom in an Ancient Christian Land

From the list on Christians in the Middle East.

Who am I?

I was infuriated to learn how my government was misrepresenting the recent war in Syria. I learned of this deceit from Syrians who had fled their war-torn country and relayed a very different narrative from the one we're all hearing. From 2016-17 Baylor University’s Institute for Oral History sponsored and archived our collection of audio-recorded interviews of Syrian Christians. This book is the end result of their entrusting us with their harrowing testimonies. I'm a Senior Lecturer in History at Baylor University. I routinely teach, among other courses, the history of the United States from a Global Perspective in which I discuss with my students the same lessons I learned while writing Syria Crucified.

Zachary's book list on Christians in the Middle East

Discover why each book is one of Zachary's favorite books.

Why did Zachary love this book?

Like most Americans I grew up with a simplistic view of the Middle East. From Western news it is easy to assume that the "Arab world" is filled almost exclusively with Muslims who live and die in an Islamic world. Gerard Russell, a former British and UN diplomat, disproves this oversimplification with his detailed travelogue in which he recounts his journeying among "forgotten" religions and civilizations such as the Mandeans and Ezidis (ancient Gnostic communities of Iraq), the Zoroastrians ("fire worshippers" of Iran), and Coptics (a pre-Islamic civilization of Egyptian Christians whose language harkens back to the Pharaohs). 

By Gerard Russell,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Heirs to Forgotten Kingdoms as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Despite its reputation for religious intolerance, the Middle East has long sheltered many distinctive and strange faiths: one regards the Greek prophets as incarnations of God, another reveres Lucifer in the form of a peacock, and yet another believes that their followers are reincarnated beings who have existed in various forms for thousands of years. These religions represent the last vestiges of the magnificent civilizations in ancient history: Persia, Babylon, Egypt in the time of the Pharaohs. Their followers have learned how to survive foreign attacks and the perils of assimilation. But today, with the Middle East in turmoil, they…


Funny in Farsi

By Firoozeh Dumas,

Book cover of Funny in Farsi

Ayser Salman Author Of The Wrong End of the Table: A Mostly Comic Memoir of a Muslim Arab American Woman Just Trying to Fit in

From the list on new worlds that made me feel less like an outsider.

Who am I?

I was born in Iraq, and grew up mostly in the Southern United States—with a brief stint in Saudi Arabia. My father taught me the importance of books and reading. And I found it was the best way to escape from the constant fish-out-of-water feeling that followed me through my nomadic childhood. I grew up, and grew out of those feelings… most of the time. But I never outgrew reading and I still love when a book sucks me in and makes me lose myself completely. These are a few of those books. 

Ayser's book list on new worlds that made me feel less like an outsider

Discover why each book is one of Ayser's favorite books.

Why did Ayser love this book?

If Durrell’s book made me feel like my family was not entirely abnormal, this one made me feel I was totally normal in my outsider-ness. Dumas recounts her experience growing up in California after moving from Iran as a young child. Reading it made me feel like I was reading about my slightly older, and definitely bolder counterpart. I wish I had the gumption she had when she was a young girl in the States. Where I spent my youth not wanting to take up space, she takes it up and does things her way. And I laughed. I laughed until my sides hurt. 

By Firoozeh Dumas,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Funny in Farsi as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

NEW YORK TIMESBESTSELLER • Finalist for the PEN/USA Award in Creative Nonfiction, the Thurber Prize for American Humor, and the Audie Award in Biography/Memoir

This Random House Reader’s Circle edition includes a reading group guide and a conversation between Firoozeh Dumas and Khaled Hosseini, author of The Kite Runner!

“Remarkable . . . told with wry humor shorn of sentimentality . . . In the end, what sticks with the reader is an exuberant immigrant embrace of America.”—San Francisco Chronicle

In 1972, when she was seven, Firoozeh Dumas and her family moved from Iran to Southern California, arriving with no…


The Colonel

By Mahmoud Dowlatabadi, Tom Patterdale (translator),

Book cover of The Colonel

Eric Lob Author Of Iran's Reconstruction Jihad: Rural Development and Regime Consolidation after 1979

From the list on Iranian history, politics, and culture.

Who am I?

I am a professor of politics and international relations with a focus on Iran. My passion for the country started while studying Persian or Farsi with an exceptional professor in graduate school. During that time, I had the privilege of traveling to Iran three times to study the language and conduct research on rural politics. This period coincided with the Green Movement uprising, a pivotal moment in the country. Since then, I have been enthralled by Iranian history, politics, and culture. Their richness and complexity make it a subject that can be studied and appreciated for a lifetime.              

Eric's book list on Iranian history, politics, and culture

Discover why each book is one of Eric's favorite books.

Why did Eric love this book?

This novel was banned in Iran and published outside of it by a renowned Iranian author who grew up in a village and moved to Tehran, where he became a prominent writer and political prisoner. It lends a surreal and personal perspective to the Iranian Revolution and the Iran-Iraq War – the two most dramatic and formative events in the Islamic Republic’s forty-year existence. It tells the haunting and heart-wrenching story of an unnamed and disgraced former army colonel, who futilely tries to keep his mind intact and his family together during this tumultuous period. The novel poignantly demonstrates how the revolution and war tore individuals and their loved ones apart to the point of madness and death. It is a microcosm of the deep-seated dissonance and disillusionment that Iranians have experienced over aspirational nationalism and piety, on one side, and endemic fragmentation and repression, on the other. A difficult…

By Mahmoud Dowlatabadi, Tom Patterdale (translator),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Colonel as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Winner of the 2013 Jan Michalski Prize
Longlististed for the Man Asian Literary Prize

A new novel by the master of Iranian letters that directly engages politics in Iran today
 
Ten years in the writing, this fearless novel—so powerful it’s banned in Iran—tells the stirring story of a tortured people forced to live under successive oppressive regimes.
 
It begins on a pitch black, rainy night, when there’s a knock on the Colonel’s door. Two policemen have come to summon him to collect the tortured body of his youngest daughter. The Islamic Revolution is devouring its own children. Set over the…