I read this book having already read Lolita, Pride and Prejudice, and The Great Gatsby which made my experience more enjoyable than one who hasn't read any of the books she mentions. Nafisi's ability to pain a perfect picture of the images forming in her mind while writing is uncanny. She's an amazing writer and knows exactly how to retell a true story and perfectly reproducing her feelings in the reader. I loved this book and recommend it to anyone who has any sort of prejudice or stereotypical tendency towards women in hijabs or Muslims in general. Nafisi explains perfectly how what we found disturbing on the news was their life and few people were agreeable to it.

I think everyone, man and woman should read this book. Solnit completely dismantled any claim that women ARE equal. She points out the weaknesses in any person who says that feminism isn't necessary, multiple paragraphs drove him many thoughts that every woman has had at one point. My favorite paragraphs is Solnit describing "mansplaining": the act of a man explaining to a woman something he is not particularly knowledgable in simply because he's a man and sees a woman as "an empty vessel needing to be filled with a man knowledge."