a review of "A Thousand Veils" and a GIVEAWAY!

A Thousand Veils by D.J. Murphy

Fatima Shihabi was raised by a loving father and family, a self described 'child of the desert', in an isolated rural town in Iraq. She learned from her oldest brother, Omar, a love of language, as he would read endless passages from the Koran to her, telling her that “You must lose yourself in these cadences, Fatima, the exquisiteness of these lines. There's no greater beauty in the world.” Fatima felt a need from her earliest days to express her experiences of the world, in stories and ultimately in her poetry, and her experiences about what Omar would call the “Others”.

”A writer has to mirror the concerns of ordinary people” he told her. “Force humanity to look itself in the face, so that maybe, on day, one glorious day, it may decide to tidy itself up, make itself right.”

It would be these two things, her love of writing and poetry and her need to champion the cause of others, especially women and children under the regime of Saddam Hussein, that would bracket her life.

Her poetry, written in secret, would strengthen her enough to save her life and her mind when she was given in marriage to an older man, who abused her both mentally and physically. From her adolescence, she followed the wishes of her father and then her husband to wear the veil, the long black traditional abayah.

“ Long before her adolescence was over, she came to perceive the subtle irony of draping a black cloth over a sentient being whose very identity was associated with self-expression. After all, it was not simply to hold a mirror to humanity that she wrote, but to change it, if only by degrees. Thus, having accepted the veil, she soon resolved to renounce it, at least in spirit, and reinvigorated her efforts to observe and engage the Others...She could hardly reconcile her soaring imagination with the physical confines of a black cloth.”

It was that imagination and that engagement of the Others that would be the source of her conflict with the Hussein government. After she was divorced by her husband, for bearing a daughter rather than a son, one of her brothers in Baghdad got her a job writing for the most influential newspaper in Iraq, about issues concerning woman and children. She was well aware of the dangers of even the slightest criticism of the government. Everyone knew of people who were taken to prison, with no charges, and horribly tortured and some who simply disappeared, presumed killed by Hussein's secret police. She was careful, but not careful enough and in time was arrested and sent to the infamous Al Khatabi Prison. After three months of torture, her brother was able to get her released but she knew that next time, imprisonment would mean her death.

But the situation in Iraq, after 9-11, with UN sanctions in place, was getting worse and worse, limited resources going to the most powerful and leaving little for hospitals or schools, children suffering the most, and Fatima could not totally silence her voice. She became involved with an underground group that had some of her articles published oversees and she was always ready for the call that would mean that she was to be arrested again and killed and that she must flee the country. When the call comes, she leaves her daughter in the relative safety of her brother Abdeljelil's house and makes it across the desert to Saudi Arabia. And it is there that her real adventure begins. No country will give her refuge and she will be returned to Iraq and her certain death if she can not find help.

Help comes in the person of a Wall Street lawyer named Charles Sherman, persuaded by his law partner Art and by Fatima's brother Omar, now an American professor, to take on her case. Charles is a man with his own ghosts, having narrowly escaped death in the World Trade Center, his mind seared with the horrible images of that day. He is a very rich and powerful and successful man, but one who comes to realize that he has chosen to wear his own veils from the world. His encounters with Fatima and her family and their experiences together will leave him a changed man, in many ways.

A Thousand Veils is an excellent book, certainly one of the most enjoyable and most thought provoking ones that I have read this year. It is many things...the personal stories of Fatima and Charles, their friendship and growing affection for each other. It is a discussion of some of the cultural and ideological differences between the Arab world and the West, a story about politics and world we live in. It is a thriller, with Hussein's secret police racing across Paris and the Alps and people fleeing across the desert with helicopters in pursuit. But ultimately, perhaps, it is a story mostly about love and family and to what lengths we will go to protect them, and it is a story about friends and how those friendships can change us all into better people. How individuals can come to better under this complex world and how individuals can
make a difference in the world.

This is Mr. Murphy first novel, and one based, he says, to some degree on a true story. And a wonderful story it is. The characters, both the major characters of Charles and Fatima and the many minor characters, like Charles' girlfriend Sarah, his law partner Art, Fatima's brothers Omar and Abdeljelil and her daughter Latifa, are all well developed and realistically portrayed. The plot is tight and logical and moves at a good pace; the description of the various locations, from NYC to Paris to the prisons of Iraq, clearly painted. It is a well told and moving story.

This is the sort of book that you just can not put down. This is the rare sort of book that I looked forward to having time to pick up to read again and one that I was sad to see draw to a conclusion. A well rounded, satisfying conclusion...but I was sad nevertheless. A book that I can give a strong recommendation to.

I am very thankful to Mr. Murphy for sending me a copy of his excellent book to read and review and therefore I will fulfill his wishes to pass the book on, as he requested, to someone else who will read and review it as well. I must say that I do rather hate to give it away...well, I guess I will have to just buy another copy perhaps....but a promise is a promise. ;-)
And I know that whoever receives it will get a very good book.
So, if you are interesting in winning a copy of A Thousand Veils, in my very first ever book giveaway, just post a comment here, with a link to your blog or some other sort of contact info. If you link back to the review and contest on your blog, you will get a second entry. Shipping to US or Canada only please. As part of the Book Giveaway Carnival over at Bookroom Reviews, I will pick the winner at random from those posted by midnight Saturday, 11/08, and post the name of the winner on Sunday.

Good luck and take a minute to enter...I think that you will love this book!

**An Update** You know, as I thought about this book and read your many comments expressing an interest in it, I decided something. First of all, I didn't want to give up my copy, because I want to share it with some family and friends. And I just want to keep it. :-)
So, I have purchase TWO brand new copies and will give both of them away to TWO lucky winners. So you have doubled your chance of winning. Or I did. It's a win, win, win situation.

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