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Betrayal and Hope in Modern Iran
by Yeganeh Torbati, Bozorgmehr Sharafedin
A moving, harrowing, and compulsively readable portrait of the lives of Iranians across five decades, tracing the promise of the 1979 revolution, its betrayal by forces of autocracy, and a people's undying spirit of resistance.
In 1979, a revolution in Iran swept aside a monarchy, fueled by the Iranian people's dreams of social justice and political freedom. But in the years that followed, the movement's leader, Ayatollah Khomeini, and his acolytes instead built a system that served their narrow faction and worsened beyond imagination the brutality and corruption that had existed under the previous government. In Stolen Revolution, award-winning journalists Yeganeh Torbati and Bozorgmehr Sharafedin tell the entwined stories of six Iranians who, together, have lived the arc of modern Iranian history in all its bitter twists and enduring hopes.
We meet Mehdi Karroubi, a devotee of Khomeini, who rose to the heights of power before being cast out of the inner circle. Hila Sedighi, a young activist, gave voice through her poetry to her peers' hopes and shattered dreams. Amir Moghadam, an ambitious government bureaucrat, witnessed corruption and graft on a scale that impelled him to take enormous risks to expose the truth. Said Rahmani returned to Iran to spark a start-up boom in his native country and encountered a ruthless security state. And Rozhin Yousefzadeh and Kosar Eftekhari, both born in the 1990s, joined a mass movement that confronted a ferocious state apparatus: the Woman, Life, Freedom protests. Each paid an enormous price. In this vivid and unforgettable narrative, Stolen Revolution centers ordinary Iranians and their destiny, even as it provides a gutting understanding of life in a modern authoritarian state.
"Journalists Torbati and Sharafedin succeed in getting a diverse group of Iranians to share intimate truths, including some that may put them at risk. The result is a nuanced portrayal of a conflicted society and a broad condemnation of key actors, including those who, despite good intentions, 'nonetheless birthed devastation when they sacrificed accountability, political inclusion, and the rule of law.' Recent hostilities only amplify this invaluable book's urgency." —Booklist (starred review)
"A modern history of Iran, told through the experiences of citizens across a range of sectors...We are left with a portrait of a nation more nuanced, complicated, and promising than the world—and perhaps even its own leaders—have fully appreciated...A consciousness-changing record of the oppression of extremism lived and resisted at the personal level." —Kirkus Reviews
"Rigorous and revelatory, a kaleidoscopic history of modern Iran that is gripping and suspenseful and endlessly interesting. Torbati and Sharafedin tell the vivid story of a group of idealists who have crashed up against the realities of a revolutionary project gone terribly awry. A masterwork of reporting, this book is a kind of skeleton key for understanding the present moment." —Jonathan Blitzer, author of Everyone Who is Gone Is Here
"A profoundly affecting account of life in modern Iran through the eyes and experiences of a group of remarkable – and remarkably brave – individuals. It is also a sobering examination of the brutal instruments of repression the regime employs to maintain power. This is one of the most incisive works on Iranian society in a generation." —Scott Anderson, author of King of Kings
This information about Stolen Revolution was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Yeganeh Torbati joined The Washington Post in 2020 and covers Turkey and Iran. She was part of a Reuters team that received the Gerald Loeb Award and the Overseas Press Club Award. She was born in Oklahoma to Iranian immigrants.
Bozorgmehr Sharafedin began his journalism career in Iran, rising to editor-in-chief of the most popular youth political magazine in the country. In 2008, he left Iran for the BBC in London. He joined Reuters in 2015, where he shared a National Press Club Award. He moved to Washington DC in 2024 and works as the Head of Digital at Persian-language Iran International.
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