After Yugoslavian and Iranian strife
November 05th, 2015
Nasreen Pejvack’s novel Amity (Inanna $22.95) charts the life-altering friendship between two very different women who share their stories of wreckage caused by Yugoslavia’s dissolution and Iran’s revolution. The story resonates with Yugoslavian and Iranian politics and its effects on women. Payvand, an Iranian refugee and activist, still plagued with nightmares, meets Ragusa, a Yugoslavian refugee whose pockets are loaded with stones ready to walk into the water and end a life that feels intolerable since the loss of those most dear to her.
Nasreen Pejvack was born in Tehran, Iran, where, pre-revolution, she worked as a writer and poet for an activist underground publication. She moved to Greece in the brutal aftermath of the 1979 revolution in Iran, and then, after nineteen months in Athens, she immigrated to Canada where she studied computer programming at Algonquin college in Ontario. After eight years in Ottawa, she continued her work in computers in Vancouver, then moved to California to work as a Systems Analyst for CNet Networks in the 1990s. With a degree in Psychology, Pejvack is now aiming for a PhD in Sociology.
978-1-77133-237-8
Amity is epic (life itself) and affected me deeply. Reading through the chapters made me laugh and cry, made me feel angry and outraged, yet at the same time brought smiles of joy and respect. It made me feel that it is our responsibility to be part of the changes the two women in the story were talking about; and I wish to have the friendship that the author developed between the two women … I wish I had the kind of support that the author, Ms. Pejvack has depicted. It is a great book, and I recommend it.
AMITY is a well written story that links the reader’s heart with historical truths of war and the world we see today. It calls our conscience to search for better and longer lasting ways to solve world problems, beginning with our more caring, daily human interaction, with all people of our one world.