Meade Saeedi

This is a story told from the perspective of Tahirih, still a teenager herself but already the mother of four children, as she grapples with the complexities of life as the wife of a well-to-do tea merchant in late nineteenth century Persia. Although uneducated, Tahirih is highly curious so is dismayed when her husband Ismail forbids her to learn to read. As she awakens to her own perceptions of the world around her, she must deal with overwhelming personal issues including the loss of her fifth child, her husband's taking a second wife, and social scorn for religious choices she makes. The novel introduces us to the bazaar which dominates life in her small town of Shiraz as well as to the glitter and power of the Shah's palaces and envoys. Shadows and Walls presents a peek at a society with which most Americans are unfamiliar, and an opportunity to travel with characters from whom we can learn much about ourselves as well as about a culture very different from our own.