52 Weeks 52 Books ~ TOGETHER TEA ~ Week Ending October 7

TOGETHER TEA by Marjan Kamali

One of our patrons recommended and brought in this book for the library, and I enjoyed reading it while on vacation.  So much of what we know about the Middle East, is what we hear from the news media.  We have family friends who escaped Iran in the 90's and this book portrayed what I knew about the immigrants who were educated, and tried to find their way here in the states, living between our culture and the one they left behind.

Mina is twenty-five year, unmarried, and has given up her love of art to study business, a field encouraged by her parents.  Her mother is also obsessed with finding her a suitable husband, and after the latest matchmaking attempt fails, Mina decides to return to Tehran to learn more about herself, and her mother, Darya also decides to travel back to Tehran with Mina. Darya has struggled to fit in in America, and she misses her family and homeland. And so mother and daughter travel back to Iran to find it the same, and yet very different. In the present day oppressive situation, families and friends attempt to find moments of color and happiness, and Mina finds a man who just might be her perfect match.

The novel also travels back in time to tell the story of Mina and Darya's family living in Iran in the seventies during the revolution.  The author captures the sense of the place and time and how the daily life of Persians changed, and how difficult it was to escape and/or to stay behind. The author has done a fine job of showing the past and the present, and the difficulty, especially for older immigrants, of adjusting to a new culture and way of life, without losing their heritage.

        ~ Katherine