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I n t e r r u p t i o n s
Farzin Rouhani, single, college student-turned-high school teacher, steps out of his parental house on the last day of spring 1981, around noon. Under Tehran's sizzling sun, his walk toward his lover’s apartment is interrupted. The timing for the lovers’ rendezvous could not have been worse, for an unauthorized opposition rally is in full swing, interrupting the traffic, provoking the ire of zealot thugs. Caught in between the warring factions, as chains and clubs descend upon demonstrators, Farzin’s hopes for seeing his friend all but evaporate. But that's not all. Under an incessant rain of bricks and stones he is mistakenly identified, as an organizer of the march by the notorious Revolutionary Guards, and subsequently arrested. This event sets the story in motion. Farzin’s arresting officer begins interrogating him in jail, a process that spans the entire summer. His mission is to discover why Farzin had come out into the streets, despite the government ban, and what his role was at the rally. But Farzin cannot reveal why he was in the street out of fear of retribution for … well, for … being a homosexual man. The penalty for being gay in the Islamic republic is death, plain and simple. Powerless and vulnerable, through a maze of confusion and hopelessness, Farzin clutches at a twig of an idea that might shed some light on the reasons for his whereabouts on March 20, 1981, without having to come out of the closet. Since he has no connection to the opposition whatsoever, he begins to fling open the vaults of his family, ending up revealing other secrets along the way. These stories, however, are seen by his captors as a ruse to cover the truth and escape punishment. Interruptions is an intimate look at the interrupted psyche of a nation whose dreams of freedom and justice have repeatedly been thwarted. The author offers a fresh and dynamic take on Iranian society and its complex rituals. The political upheavals in a country dominated by fanatics are the backdrop to Massud Alemi’s novel, where the rich history of one Persian family is interwoven with the misfortunes of a nation. The novel carries us through assorted realms of magic and history, to places and people who capture the mind with awe and wonder.
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