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A Fort of Nine Towers: An Afghan Family Story, by Qais Akbar Omar
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Twenty-three years ago―after the Soviets left and before the Taliban came to power―Kabul was a garden where seven-year-old Qais Akbar Omar flew kites from the roof of his grandfather's house. Then came the hollow sounds of rocket fire as the Mujahedin, self-proclaimed holy warriors, took over Afghanistan, and the country erupted in civil war. Omar's family fled, leaving everything behind to take shelter in an old fort. But after a narrow escape from death, his father decided that the family must leave the country.
Yet the journey proved more difficult than anticipated, and in this stunning coming-of-age memoir, Omar offers a moving recollection of these events―a story of daily hardships, relieved by moments of joy and immense beauty. Inflected with folktales and steeped in poetry, A Fort of Nine Towers is a life-affirming triumph.
- Sales Rank: #346261 in Books
- Published on: 2014-04-08
- Released on: 2014-04-08
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.14" h x 1.10" w x 5.49" l, .0 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 416 pages
From Booklist
*Starred Review* Omar’s Afghan childhood encompassed the love of an extended family and the violent tyranny of warlords and the Taliban, and he renders every facet with the glorious precision and rich palette of the exquisite carpets that provided a livelihood for his grandfather, father, and, eventually, himself. Kabul in the 1980s was a lush garden, where young Omar flew kites, excelled at school, and played with a band of cousins. The Mujahedin rapidly destroyed this verdant world, and Omar and his family fled the city for the Fort of Nine Towers, an old outpost filled with flowers, fruit trees, deer, peacocks, even a leopard. But war came to this paradise, too, precipitating his family’s death-defying cross-country quest for sanctuary. They joined nomadic relatives on a caravan and lived in the caves behind one of the towering Buddhas of Bamiyan, which the Taliban later destroyed. Though he is as modest as he is entrancing, Omar clearly was a preternaturally attentive, sensitive boy with a gift for languages and an artistic eye, who embraced the diversity, beauty, and wisdom of Afghan life. He also suffered the soul-scarring horrors of looting, bombs, snipers, homelessness, atrocities, incarceration, and torture. Omar tells this staggering true story of a life and a land of radiance and terror with magnificent humility, grace, and power. --Donna Seaman
Review
“Poetic, powerful, and unforgettable.” ―Khaled Hosseini, New York Times bestselling author of The Kite Runner and And the Mountains Echoed
“Mind-boggling yet matter-of-fact...A riveting story of war as seen through a child's eyes and summoned from an adult's memory.” ―The New York Times Book Review
“A Fort of Nine Towers captures a time and a place unknown to most Americans….Exceptional.” ―The Boston Globe
“An extraordinary memoir...Even more haunting than The Kite Runner.” ―The Philadelphia Inquirer
“Beautifully written, with the pacing and suspense of a novel...[A Fort of Nine Towers] is deeply fulfilling, remarkable not least because Omar lived to tell the tale.” ―The Washington Post
“A classic autobiography of universal resonance...Tender and hopeful against all odds.” ―Newsweek
“From squatting inside a cave in the head of a Bamyan Buddha to escaping torture at the teeth of a dog and his master, Qais Akbar Omar's tale of one family's journey during the Afghan civil war is inscriptional: its images carve themselves into the reader's mind. Unlike most accounts of life in exile, A Fort of Nine Towers never leaves Afghanistan, as a boy and his family remain trapped within the nation's borders by familial ties and by war. This book is essential reading for anyone eager to learn what more than three decades of war have cost the Afghan people.” ―Eliza Griswold, author of the New York Times bestseller The Tenth Parallel: Dispatches from the Fault Line Between Christianity and Islam
“At a time when Afghanistan threatens to recede into a bloody and debased footnote, Qais Akbar Omar reminds us of the honor and courage of his people. A remarkable feat of memory and imagination.” ―Joydeep Roy-Bhattacharya, author of The Watch and The Storyteller of Marrakesh
“In this stark, unflinching memoir, Qais Akbar Omar illuminates the beauty and tragedy of a country pushed to the brink by war. A Fort of Nine Towers gives voice to the unbreakable spirit of the Afghan people.” ―G. Willow Wilson, author of Alif the Unseen
“As lyrical as it is haunting, this mesmerizing, not-to-be-missed debut memoir is also a loving evocation of a misunderstood land and people....A gorgeously rich tapestry of an amazing life and culture.” ―Kirkus, Starred Review
“Omar's prose is deliciously forthright, extravagant, and somewhere mischievous, and very Afghan in its sense of long-suffering endurance and also reconciliation.” ―Publishers Weekly
“I know of no other book in which the complex realities of life--and death--in contemporary Afghanistan are so starkly and intimately portrayed. This brave memoir, rich in tough humor and insight, recounts an insider's view into both the suffering and the integrity of an uncompromisingly proud and courageous people. Above all, it is a powerful reminder of the extraordinary tenacity of a culture that foreigners have repeatedly and fatally misjudged.” ―Jason Elliot, author of An Unexpected Light: Travels in Afghanistan
“This is a book for those who love Afghanistan, for those who want to understand it, or simply for those who value deeply the best in the human spirit. It is a tale that deserves to rank with The Kite Runner.” ―Ronal d E. Neumann, former U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan and president of the American Academy of Diplomacy
“If you read only one book this summer, make it this one....Astonishing.” ―Jeanette Winterson, O, The Oprah Magazine
About the Author
Qais Akbar Omar (whose first name is pronounced "Kice") manages his family's carpet business and writes books. In 2007, he was a visiting scholar at the University of Colorado. He has studied business at Brandeis University and now lives in Boston, where he is pursuing an MFA in creative writing at Boston University. Omar has lectured on Afghan carpets in Afghanistan, Europe, and the United States. He is the coauthor, with Stephen Landrigan, of Shakespeare in Kabul.
Most helpful customer reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful.
A Fort of Nine Towers.....Modern Masterpiece
By Anne Moose
The very first thing I did when I finished reading A Fort of Nine Towers was boot up my computer and order eight more copies to pass out to family and friends. This is one of those books that makes you think, “Everyone should read this book.” I hesitate to review it, because I don’t know if I’m a strong enough writer to do it justice, but I’m going to try, because I think it’s a flat out masterpiece—for so many reasons, and on so many levels. A book that comes to mind that I put in a similar category is Angela’s Ashes. Like Angela’s Ashes, A Fort of Nine Towers tells a terrible story, but beautifully, and in a way that teaches profound lessons about what it means to be human on much of this planet.
Fundamentally, it’s the autobiography of a young man who grew up in Afghanistan during the years running up to the time, following 9/11, when the United States declared war on the Taliban. To say that these years were hellish for the people of Afghanistan is an understatement. Some of the experiences that the author’s family lived through—being caught in the middle of a civil war, and then ultimately falling under the control of the Taliban—are so ghastly that they’re painful to read. But the author tells the story so beautifully, and with so much love and tenderness towards his extended family, and the people who helped his family when they were desperate, that you can’t help but fall in love not only with the author, but with all the decent Afghani people who were trapped in a storm of almost unfathomable chaos and cruelty. If ever there was a book that drives home the terrible cost of modern warfare on ordinary people, this is it—both in terms of what people suffer, and what some people become.
In A Fort of Nine Towers, Qais Akbar Omar describes man’s inhumanity to man in such a personal way that it cuts to your core. But he also describes his love for his family and the generosity of many of his countrymen in ways that many of us in the West will find extraordinary. In short, this book is both heartbreaking and beautiful, describing what it is to be human from one extreme to the other—from total love and altruism, to the most terrible cruelty imaginable. It is a fascinating, beautiful, painful, profound journey across the landscape of humanity, and an important insight into a place and people we all read about in the news, but do not even remotely know or understand. For anyone who is interested in gaining some understanding, I suggest you read this book. If you do, I can almost guarantee that you will never be the same.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful.
Inshallah the future for Afghanistan
By Benjamin Africa III
The reason this book gets such high reviews is that it is a moving account of a family living in a country during some of the hardest times one could imagine. The author in my case was able to reaffirm my positive feeling for the Afghan population. I have read too many books dealing with the negative side of the continuing conflict. Not every one is a Hekmatyar, or a Talib. This book shows that with the survival of people like the author and more like him Afghanistan has a chance of stabilizing and taking a place in a peaceful world. The book will keep ones attention and hopefully move a person to want to visit and meet some of the people he talks about. In an earlier publication I read that a British officer from times in the past called the Afghans the friendliest people on the earth. Qais Akbar Omar is one of those to whom he referred. I await his next book.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful.
Wonderful book
By Megan
This is an incredible book. I kept thinking things like, "unbelievable" and "extraordinary", quickly forgetting that this is a memoir and real life for so many in Afghanistan. Qais's love for his family, his dedication to his country, and his anger and frustration with Afghanistan's turmoil is the first real account I've ever read about life there. Beginning with the wars between factions after the Russians were driven out, following through the Taliban's reign and America's bombings, Qais gives readers a detailed account of his life, through the eyes of a child up through adulthood. I am so impressed, humbled and mesmerized by his words. I recommend this book to anyone who believes the truths of history are more important than the victors' accounts written in textbooks or displayed in the media.
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