What an intense read! I knew immediately that I was going to love this book when I heard Mozhan Marno's voice. She is the perfect narrator for Sitara and I will definitely be researching to see if she narrates any other books.

The writing is absolutely poetic! If I'd been reading an e-copy, it would have been full of highlighted sentences that caught my attention. Sitara/Aryana is wonderfully complex and haunted by the trauma of her past and it fills the story with sorrow and heartache. I enjoyed the structure of the story and was glad the past and present weren't unfolding simultaneously. This book is so well-written that it's easy to believe Sitara/Aryana, Antonia and Tilly are real people.

This is the perfect book for fans of The Kite Runner and historical cultural fiction! I've never read any of Nadia Hashimi's other books but that will be changing post-haste.

"Afghanistan’s secret weapon has always been her women."

Thanks so much to Netgalley and the publisher for the audio ARC!