“A valuable addition to the canon of literature on the country . . . Seierstad writes compellingly, with an eye for the details and dialogue that make her subjects come to life. She manages to achieve a rare intimacy, something that is tough in a book about Afghanistan, a place where outsiders are seldom allowed inside homes and most men don't speak the names of their wives publicly.”

New York Times Book Review

Ambitious . . . absorbing . . . Burrowing into both Afghan family life and the country's convoluted politics, the book follows three people over several decades, culminating in the dramatic first year of the Taliban restoration . . . Seierstad's short, punchy sentences, ably translated by Seán Kinsella, draw readers into the narrative.

The Boston Globe

Deeply researched and empathetically reported, this volume is a monumental modern history of a country about which most Westerners know little.

Ms. Magazine

A moving history . . . Indelible portraits of people struggling to survive in a war-torn land. - Kirkus Reviews, starred review

A gripping, richly textured account of Afghanistan's ordeal that humanizes all sides.

Publishers Weekly

Seierstad chronicles years of war and the rise and resurgence of the Taliban through the intimate, affecting portraits of three lives lived in history's shadow.

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