Book launch

The Gowkaran Tree in the Middle of our Kitchen | Shokoofeh Azar

From International Booker Prize finalist Shokoofeh Azar, a stylistically audacious and emotionally powerful novel about one large, complicated family and a passionate love affair.

Spanning fifty years in the history of modern Iran, this lush, layered story embraces politics and family, revolution and reconstruction, loss and love, as it recounts the colourful destinies of twelve children who get lost one long-ago night inside a mysterious palace.

Each lost child’s story unfolds against the backdrop of immense cultural and political transformation; lovers must survive war, revolution, and rigid social strictures to keep their love alive; family bonds are tested, especially those indissoluble connections between the living and the dead. The Gowkaran Tree in the Middle of Our Kitchen is also the moving story of one family’s efforts to preserve the richness of Iranian culture in the face of Islamic hegemony following the 1979 revolution.

Born in Iran in 1972, Shokoofeh Azar was the first Iranian woman to hitchhike the entire length of the Silk Road. She worked as a newspaper editor and journalist in Iran, covering issues relating to women’s rights. After several arrests in connection with her work as a journalist, on advice from her family, she fled Iran in 2010, and was granted asylum in Australia, where she has lived as a political refugee since 2011. She is the author of essays, articles, and children’s books. Her first novel, The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree, was shortlisted for the Stella Prize for Fiction and the International Booker Prize, and was a finalist for the PEN America Award and the National Book Award for Translated Literature. This new novel has already received two awards for a manuscript-in-progress (The Australian Council for the Arts; Victoria Creative).

will be in conversation with Lucie Cutting. Lucie is a broadcaster and features reporter based in nipaluna/Hobart. As host of Sundays on ABC Radio Hobart and Northern Tasmania, Lucie has many years experience in conversational interviews.

Join Shokoofeh and Lucie at the Afterword Cafe.