Albania: Uncertain Journey

Uncertain Journey
by James Rouman

 



 

I had a difficult time settling on a book set in Albania. I really wanted to read something by Ismail Kadare, the literary darling of Albania who was a contender for the 2013 Nobel Prize for Literature, but the local library didn't have a single one of his books. So I picked this one up instead.

Uncertain Journey takes place in Greece and the United States, with only the background of the main character's life story taking place in Albania. Rejep is an illegal immigrant who left Albania in search of a better life. I have an abiding interest in stories about immigrants and find it interesting to consider at what point an immigrant's tale becomes emblematic of the destination country rather than the origin country. This book wasn't quite that ambitious, but it did a decent job of putting a face on the often faceless and controversial issue of illegal immigration.

Rejep decides to leave Albania in search of a better life and a brighter future, as is the case with many immigrants.  First, he simply crosses over into Greece, where he meets Eudoxia, a Greek-American young woman who is living with extended family for a year and trying to figure out her path.  When she returns to the United States, he follows her, and the two strike up a fledgling little romance that is doomed from the start thanks to the intolerance of Eudoxia's mother and the lack of stability that comes with being an undocumented alien in a strange new place.  Rejep finds some limited understanding among the other immigrants, who simultaneously seek a sense of community while also closing the ranks against anyone who is different from them.  There isn't a lot of action in this novel, but that's okay.  What it lacks in excitement, it makes up for in its poignant exploration of the immigrant experience.  I do wish there'd been more about Albania since, after all, that's the whole reason I picked up the book in the first place.

A lesson learned from this selection is that in the future, I will hold out for the book I really want to read, either by being patient and continuing to search until I'm happy with my choice or by breaking open the piggy bank and purchasing the book I feel excited about.  There are a couple of different things at play here.

One is that, as I've mentioned previously, I believe that my books choose me rather than the other way around.  Once I finish one novel, I have to sit with it for at least a day before moving onto the next one, partly to let the story wash over me and partly, I think, to see what book is going to come up next.  I don't like to read two books in a row that are too similar or by the same author (which means it takes me longer than the average bear to get through the current trend of trilogies in YA literature.)  During the gap between books, I will scan my bookshelf at home, see what my friends are reading on Goodreads, take a peek at the Kindle daily deals and in the Kindle store.  If I happen to be out and about, I may pop into Barnes and Noble to see what looks interesting.  And I review my TBR (to be read) list to see what jumps out at me.  Most of the time, I'm drawn to a specific book or at least to a specific genre.  On the occasions I've not listened to that inner book voice, I'm usually unfocused in my reading and often give up before I've gotten very far in the story.  Anyone else have this experience, or have I completely lost my mind?

The other thing going on with me is that I'm trying mightily to embrace a more minimalist lifestyle, and one element of that involves reducing the amount of stuff I own or otherwise bring into my home that has to be dealt with in some way.  These days, being a minimalist can mean a wide range of things from whittling your possessions down to only 100 items or simply exerting effort to declutter, purge, and stop buying things you don't really need.  Getting down to 100 items, or anywhere near that number, is: a) unrealistic; b) unappealing; c) unnecessary; and d) not gonna happen.  I like my big house ... I just don't want it to be filled with junk I don't need.  I like reading on my Kindle ... but I also like real books on my shelves and occasionally, in my hands.  That said, my minimalist leanings have caused me to be more thoughtful about what I spend money on and what I decide is worthy of bringing into my personal space.  In the past, my motto about book buying was "See it ... want it ... buy it."  But I'm trying to be more judicious by frequenting the public library, borrowing from friends, looking for sales, and using the "try a sample" feature on my Kindle.  I haven't really settled into a new normal with this initiative and at the moment, I'm finding it all to be mainly an irritant that is interfering with my enjoyment of the whole book experience.  Which is why, when I couldn't find the Ismail Kadare book I had in mind, I resisted purchasing it and borrowed Uncertain Journey from the library instead.  No disrespect intended to James Rouman, but next time, I'm going to buy the book I really want.  Some of life's pleasures are just worth cluttering up the house.

Other Books Considered for Albania

• Broken April, by Ismail Kadare (fiction)
• The Successor, by Ismail Kadare (fiction)
• The Fall of the Stone City, by Ismail Kadare (fiction)
• Agamemnon’s Daughter, by Ismail Kadare (fiction – short stories)
• The Silencer, by Paul Alkazraji (thriller)
• The Accursed Mountains, by Robert Carver (memoir)
• Albania’s Mountain Queen, by Marcus Tanner (biography)
• The Unexpected Mrs. Pillifax, by Dorothy Gilman (mystery)

NEXT UP ... ALGERIA.  Let me know if you have any suggestions!

Afghanistan: The Pearl that Broke its Shell

The Pearl that Broke its Shell
by Nadia Hashimi

One of the main reasons I set out to read a book set in every country is because I believe with all my heart that fiction opens up a window into the world and casts light on our shared human experiences, which we may otherwise never take time to consider.  As I searched for a book set in or about the provocative country of Afghanistan, I found that many of the bestselling and recently-written books focus on war.  This is similar to what I’ve discovered in my efforts to read about Vietnam, the country from which my husband and I adopted our youngest child.  But I hear plenty about war-torn Afghanistan on the news and have seen plenty of war-torn Vietnam in movies.  What I'm looking for are stories that bring the people of other countries to life in my imagination, make them more real in my mind, and remind me that no matter what's happening politically, we are more alike than different in our shared humanity.  I wanted to read a novel that would tell me something about the Afghan people through the lens of their daily lives. 

                          

The Pearl that Broke its Shell is a beautiful, heartbreaking story of two women, living in Afghanistan with 100 years spanning between them, who struggle to cope and survive with the hardship that plagues all women of that country.  The novel weaves back and forth in time, between the stories of Rahima, a young girl growing up in a small village in modern Afghanistan, and Shekiba, who is Rahima’s great-great-grandmother.  The clear and very compelling theme is the plight of women, how vulnerable and subjugated they are to men and by tradition, and how little has changed over the span of a century. 

Because Rahima is one of five daughters in a family without the all-important son, her mother decides to make her a bacha posh, a girl who pretends to be a boy and is treated, by everyone, as a boy.  Having a bacha posh makes life a little better for the family since Rahima, now called Rahim, can go out unchaperoned to run errands, to attend school, to work, and to interact more boldly with men without fear of shaming or dishonoring her parents.  Rahim finds intoxicating freedom in life as a boy, and when her time as a bacha posh comes to an end as she is married off at the age of 13, the cloistered life of being a woman in Afghanistan is all the more bitter a pill.  To help her to cope with the sudden and dramatic shift back to a life without freedom or affection, Rahima’s unmarried aunt tells her the story of Shekiba, whose journey through womanhood is hauntingly similar despite the 100 years that separates them.  After losing her entire family to cholera and being sold as a servant to repay her uncle’s debt, Shekiba is given to the king’s delegation as a gift.  Although she is frightened and lonely, she finds some solace when she is charged with guarding the king's concubines, a role she must play while posing as a man.  She, too, finds unimaginable freedom in shedding the burdens of womanhood, but everything falls apart when she is unfairly accused of allowing a strange man to visit the harem at night.  She narrowly escapes her consequence ... death by stoning ... when the stranger offers to take her as his second wife.  She, too, find the return to life as a woman to be stifling, frightening, and isolating.    

The women in Hashimi's novel face a brutal existence, one where they rarely take solace in friendship with one another as they all fight for the scraps of kindness and opportunity wherever they may find them.  There are momentary pockets of brightness, predictably in the love each woman has for her children, and for Rahima, in the small bit of progressive thinking that comes to Afghanistan via the Westerners who are there for war.  Despite a few scenes that seemed a little too dramatic, the novel is a beautifully written, haunting story that will stick with you long after the final page.

 

Other Books Considered for Afghanistan

•  The Swallows of Kabul, by Yasmina Khadra  (fiction)
• The Man Who Would be King, by Rudyard Kipling (fiction)
• The Secret Sky, by Leila Roy (YA fiction)
• Kabul Beauty School, by Deborah Rodriguez (memoir)
• The Places Inbetween, by Rory Stewart  (memoir)
• Sardar, by Abdullah Sharif (memoir)

 Previously Read - A Partial List

• The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini
• And the Mountains Echoed, by Khaled Hosseini
• A Thousand Splendid Suns, by Khaled Hosseini
• The Dressmaker of Khair Khana, by Gayle Tzemach Lemmon

 

So What's the Plan?

I read voraciously ... some would say obsessively.  I read every single day, for at least half an hour if I'm chaotically busy and longer if I can squeeze any extra time out of my day.  I don't skim, but I do read fast, not because I'm trying to speed read but because I've just read so much throughout my life that I've gotten pretty good at it.  On average, I read between three and six books per month and wish I could cram a few more in.

I've never done a book challenge, preferring instead to read whatever is up next for my book club or whatever grabs me while I'm perusing my bookshelf, the bookstore's bookshelf, or my Kindle store.  Four months ago, I left a pretty intense job to move with my husband and (mostly grown) kids away from the Washington, D.C. area to the smaller town of Harrisonburg, Virginia.  We made this move for many reasons, one of which was a desire for a better quality of life that would be less frantic and more rife with opportunities to spend time with family, hear ourselves think, and do things we love.  Like reading.  Four months later, I'm thrilled with our new home and lifestyle, but I also miss the daily challenge of my former intense and exceedingly interesting job.  And so, I decided to introduce a little challenge into my otherwise calm and tranquil life by reading one book that is set in every country of the world. 

I'm certainly not the first person to do this.  In fact, Ann Morgan did exactly the same thing and will soon release a book about her reading adventures.  I follow her blog, A Year of Reading the World, and will certainly buy her book when it hits the shelves in the summer of 2015.  Shelbi Wescott did something similar when she mapped out a journey of 80 books in 80 countries.  Her blog, Around the World in 80 Books, is no longer active but still quite worthwhile to review.  She ended up writing a book, too, but I believe hers is fiction that is not based on her book-reading journey.  I don't expect to get a book deal out of my journey.  In fact, it only occurred to me to blog about this because a couple of very good, very supportive friends encouraged me and seem to think that others may be interested in what I have to say.

So, what are my rules?  They're pretty simple.

1)  I will read the countries in alphabetical order, from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe.  I'll be using the U.S. Department of State's list of countries.   

2)  The book has to be set, at least in part, in the selected country.

3)  The author does not have to be from that country.  In fact, my favorite perspective to read is that of an American narrator who is experiencing the world outside of his or her comfort zone or, in the reverse, a foreign narrator who is experiencing the United States.  Having lived overseas and having a well-used passport, I enjoy contemplating the challenges people face when confronting the proverbial clash of cultures.

4)  I reserve the right to read other books that have nothing to do with this self-imposed challenge.  I may or may not write about them.  Sometimes there's a book that chooses me, rather than the other way around, and it's not in my nature to resist this too strenuously.

5)  Don't judge me ... but I probably won't be choosing classics or anything that's necessarily worthy of a college English course.  I have a master's degree in literature and have read my share of the Canon and other great works.  I've loved most of them and am proud to be well-read, but at this stage of my life, I'm looking for something different.  I like fiction and occasionally memoirs.  I'm happy to read about any historical time period, but I prefer contemporary novels that were written in the past 25 years or so. 

6)  I'm happy to receive suggestions for titles, just don't be mad if I don't pick your recommendation.

7)  There is no time limit.  I read for my own edification and pleasure, and the time I spend with my books is sacrosanct ... not to be compromised by having to watch a clock or a calendar.

And that's it!  Seven simple guidelines for what I hope will be a great adventure of exploring the world by book.  Here we go.