A Season for Martyrs

(Paperback)

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The U.S. literary debut of an up-and-coming Pakistani novelist and journalist. The last three months of Benazir Bhutto's life - from her arrival back in Pakistan on October 18, 2007, to her untimely death in a shooting-cum-suicide bombing on December 27th is told through the eyes of a young television journalist in Bina Shah's intense confessional novel A Season for Martyrs. The estranged son of a wealthy landowner from the interior region of Sindh, Ali Sikandar, is assigned by his producer to cover the arrival of Benazir Bhutto, the opposition leader who has returned home to Karachi after eight years of exile to take part in the presidential race. But Ali finds himself swept up in events larger than his individual struggle for identity and love when he joins the People's Resistance Movement, a civil group that opposes the current government of President Musharraf, the benevolent dictator turned strongman. Amidst deadly terrorist attacks, protest marches and rallies in favor of and against Bhutto, this contemporary narrative thread weaves in flashbacks that chronicle the history of Ali's own feudal family and its connection to the Bhutto family. As Shah illustrates with extraordinary depth the many contradictions of a country that still struggles to fully embrace modernity, Ali's life opens in a new direction and the young man rediscovers love, the desire to fight and the power to forgive his father.

Reviews

Riveting and articulate, A Season for Martyrs by Pakistani journalist Bina Shah is the author's debut novel for an American readership and clearly denotes her ability to deftly craft and complex storey of suspenseful twists and unexpected turns that holds the reader's total attention from beginning to end. Very highly recommended for personal reading lists.
A LIBRARY JOURNAL TOP INDIE FICTION FOR FALL 2014: Good reading, urgently and cleanly told, for those interested in world events, as well as issues of identity and place in community.
Shah's spirited novel is set in modern Pakistan and is steeped in its rich Sindhi heritage and culture. As it hurtles toward its violent climax, Shah's novel is both fascinating and eye-opening.

Author Bio

Bina Shah has recently become a regular contributor to The International New York Times. She is a Pakistani writer who is a frequent guest on the BBC. She has contributed essays to Granta, The Independent, and The Guardian and writes a monthly column for Dawn, the top English-language newspaper in Pakistan. She holds degrees from Wellesley College and the Harvard Graduate School of Education, and is an alumna of the University of Iowas International Writers Workshop. Her novel Slum Child was a bestseller in Italy, and she has been published in English, Spanish, German and Italian. A Season for Martyrs is her U.S. debut. She lives in Karachi.