In 2007, nine-year-old Rahima lives with her parents and
four sisters in Kabul. Her father is increasingly dysfunctional, and the family
is barely surviving. With no brothers to protect them, the girls can seldom
leave the house, even to attend school.
Her mother decides she should become a bacha posh, a girl who dresses as
a boy so that she can go to the market, and escort her sisters when they go
out. This is an ancient Afghan custom
which allows a girl to dress as, and be treated like, a boy until she is of
marriageable age.
Rahima is not the first in her family to adopt this custom.
A century earlier, her great-great grandmother, Shekiba, left orphaned by an
epidemic, saved herself and built a new life the same way. As a young girl,
Sekiba was scarred by kitchen oil and reviled by her family. She eventually
made her way to the king’s palace in Kabul, dressing as a man to guard his harem.
For a few years, Rahima enjoys freedoms unavailable to most
girls. But when she is 13 she is forced to marry a vicious warlord who decides
he wants her for his wife. She finds
strength in her aunt’s stories of her ancestor Shekiba. Alternating between the
two, Hashimi weaves a compelling tale of two women, separated by a century, who
seem to share a destiny.
Recommended for those who enjoyed 'The Kite Runner'.
469 pages
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