Kabul, 1978: The daughter of a prominent family, Sitara Zamani lives a privileged life in Afghanistan’s thriving cosmopolitan capital. The 1970s are a time of remarkable promise under the leadership of people like Sardar Daoud, Afghanistan’s progressive president, and Sitara’s beloved father, his right-hand man. But the ten-year-old Sitara’s world is shattered when communists stage a coup, assassinating the president and Sitara’s entire family. Only she survives.
Smuggled out of the palace by a guard named Shair, Sitara finds her way to the home of a female American diplomat, who adopts her and raises her in America. In her new country, Sitara takes on a new name—Aryana Shepherd—and throws herself into her studies, eventually becoming a renowned surgeon. A survivor, Aryana has refused to look back, choosing instead to bury the trauma and devastating loss she endured.
New York, 2008: Thirty years after that fatal night in Kabul, Aryana’s world is rocked again when an elderly patient appears in her examination room—a man she never expected to see again. It is Shair, the soldier who saved her, yet may have murdered her entire family. Seeing him awakens Aryana’s fury and desire for answers—and, perhaps, revenge. Realizing that she cannot go on without finding the truth, Aryana embarks on a quest that takes her back to Kabul—a battleground between the corrupt government and the fundamentalist Taliban—and through shadowy memories of the world she loved and lost.
Bold, illuminating, heartbreaking, yet hopeful, Sparks Like Stars is a story of home—of America and Afghanistan, tragedy and survival, reinvention and remembrance, told in Nadia Hashimi’s singular voice.
I'm honoured to be hosting the blog tour for Sparks Like Stars today. Huge thanks to Nadia Hashimi, Harper Collins 360 and Anne Cater from Random Things Tours for inviting me and for my advance copy of the novel.
For almost fifty years, Afghanistan has been synonymous with war and terrorism. From the Soviet-Afghan War to the invasion by the United States and its allies as part of the global 'War on Terror' that followed the September 11th terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, and the Taliban's recent return to power, it's a country of violence and refugees, landmines and oppression. However, there was a brief period between the 1950s and 70s when Afghanistan was a progressive, more liberal country; despite the centuries of conflict, the country became more modernised and Kabul was a stop on the counterculture Hippie Trail. Ten-year-old Sitara Zamani's childhood during this time has been one of privilege; her father is President Daoud Khan's trusted adviser and she has grown up exploring every square foot of Arg, the presidential palace.
The opening chapters of Sparks Like Stars introduce us to Sitara and as she absorbs her father's advice, often told through poems and songs, the sense of foreboding, knowing what is to come is painfully poignant. When her family is killed during the Saur Revolution, their deaths are barely described on the page and yet the traumatic weight of them is starkly portrayed, bearing down on Sitara, who witnesses their murder before being saved by a palace guard turned revolutionary. Shocked, confused and angry, her emotions burst from the pages of Sparks Like Stars and will surely pierce the hearts of other readers as they did mine. The guard, Shair hands her over to Antonia, an American diplomat who works at the US Embassy and her mother, Tilly. Her initial mistrust of the two women is poignantly understandable but if this is a story about loss, it's also about survival and as she decides to put her faith in them, her bravery ultimately results in a dramatic escape.
The chapters set in Afghanistan bring the country vividly to life and although the violence and bloodshed soon hangs heavily over proceedings, Nadia Hashimi also evokes the lingering memories of food, celebrations and literature that never leave Sitara, even after she is forced to give up everything she knew – including her identity. She arrives in America bearing the name of her long-dead sister, Aryana and after the bleakly familiar scenes where she almost falls through the cracks into foster care, we learn she was eventually adopted by Antonia.
The novel then fast-forwards to November 2008 and Aryana is now an oncology surgeon working in New York City. The brief glimpses we are given into the preceding years make it clear that despite loving and feeling deeply loved by the woman she now calls 'Mom', there's a wall around Aryana that means she has never truly confronted her past. America is her home but Afghanistan is where she's from and it's only when Shair turns up as a patient that she finally makes the emotional decision to go back there. Nadia Hashimi empathetically explores survivor's guilt, grief and the desperate need to discover the truth and it's rather moving to realise that her choice of career has meant she has taken more time helping other families come to terms with their losses than she has her own.
The final part of the novel is set in Kabul and it's desperately bittersweet knowing that this moment of relative peace, with some hope in the air and a desire to acknowledge the wrongs of the past will once again be cut short by the resurgence of the Taliban. Nevertheless, this is Sitara's story of her tragedy and her courage, her need to look back and accept her blamelessness and her grief before she can truly look forward. It's a thought-provoking, enlightening examination of how the colonialism and imperialism of the Cold War ravaged countries of their histories and their futures and it's a novel that understands the importance of belonging and family, culture and civilization – on an individual and much larger scale. Melancholic yet hopeful, uncompromising yet beautifully poetic, Sparks Like Stars captured my heart, it's a stunning book and one that will linger long in my memory.
Sparks Like Stars is published in the UK by William Morrow, publishing links can be found here but please support independent bookshops when possible.
Don't miss the rest of the blog tour, details are below.
Nadia Hashimi is a paediatrician turned novelist who draws on her Afghan culture to craft internationally bestselling books for adults as well as young readers. Nadia was born and raised in New York and New Jersey. Both her parents were born in Afghanistan and left in the early 1970s, before the Soviet invasion. In 2002, Nadia made her first trip to Afghanistan with her parents. She is a pediatrician and lives with her family in the Washington, DC, suburbs. She is the author of three books for adults, as well as the middle grade novels ONE HALF FROM THE EAST and THE SKY AT OUR FEET.
This sounds a fascinating book. A book giving glimpses of Afghanistan before war caused so much pain and destruction is perfect for us all to get perspective of what has happened to that country. I'll be looking for this book in my local bookshop. Thanks for your review.
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