The Immortals of Tehran

By: Ali Araghi

Narrated by: Peter Ganim

This generations-spanning novel carries one extraordinary family to the brink of the Iranian Revolution--and marks the debut of a literary talent to watch

As a child living in his family's apple orchard, Ahmad Torkash-Vand treasures his great-great-great-great grandfather's every mesmerizing world. On the day of his father's death, Ahmad listens closely as the seemingly immortal elder tells him the tale of a centuries-old family curse . . . and the boy's own fated role in the story.

Ahmad grows up to suspect that something unseen must be interfering with his family, as he struggles to hold them together through decades of famine, loss, and political turmoil in Iran. As the world transforms around him, each turn of Ahmad's life is a surprise: from street brawler to father of two impossibly gifted daughters; from radical poet to politician with a target on his back. These lives, and the many unforgettable stories alongside his, converge and catch fire at the center of the Revolution.

A sweeping, multi-generational epic, this stunning debut heralds the arrival of a unique new literary voice. Exploring the brutality of history while conjuring the astonishment of magical realism, The Immortals of Tehran is a story of the incantatory power of words and the revolutionary sparks of love, family, and poetry--set against the indifferent, relentless march of time.

Unique story with many characters

I really enjoyed this book and found the fictional/fantasy parts of it different and interesting especially as they meshed into the otherwise normal world. There are a lot of characters and the author and reader both made it easy to know whose point of view I was hearing. I have read other books where I get lost in the transition and this was not the case with this book.