Sons and Other Flammable Objects

Last updated

Sons and Other Flammable Objects (2007) is a novel by the Iranian-American novelist Porochista Khakpour. It is published by New York Grove ( ISBN   9780802118530).

The book depicts the struggles of an Iranian family, refugees of the Iranian Revolution, trying to make sense of their new lives in the United States, in an apartment in Pasadena, California. The main character is the teenager Xerxes Adam. [1]

The history of the nation is embedded in the personal history of the characters, similar to The Blind Owl by Sadegh Hedayat. [2]

The novel won the 77th California Book Award for First Fiction. [3] It was also a New York Times Editor's Choice [4] and included on the Chicago Tribune's 2007 "Fall's Best" list. It was also shortlisted for the William Saroyan International Prize for Writing, and long-listed for the 2008 Dylan Thomas Prize. [5]

Reviews

According to Kirkus Reviews , the characters are "caught between incompatible worlds, one past and romanticized, the other present but inaccessible." [6] The New York Times praised the novel for its "punchy conversation, vivid detail, sharp humor." [7] Grove Atlantic favorably compared it to Zadie Smith's White Teeth for its "rolling storytelling cadences and wry wit". [8]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">American Museum of Natural History</span> Natural history museum in Manhattan, New York

The American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) is a natural history museum on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City. Located in Theodore Roosevelt Park, across the street from Central Park, the museum complex comprises 21 interconnected buildings housing 45 permanent exhibition halls, in addition to a planetarium and a library. The museum collections contain about 32 million specimens of plants, animals, fungi, fossils, minerals, rocks, meteorites, human remains, and human cultural artifacts, as well as specialized collections for frozen tissue and genomic and astrophysical data, of which only a small fraction can be displayed at any given time. The museum occupies more than 2,500,000 sq ft (232,258 m2). AMNH has a full-time scientific staff of 225, sponsors over 120 special field expeditions each year, and averages about five million visits annually.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sadegh Hedayat</span> Iranian writer (1903–1951)

Sadegh Hedayat was an Iranian writer and translator. Best known for his novel The Blind Owl, he was one of the earliest Iranian writers to adopt literary modernism in their career.

<i>The Blind Owl</i> Book by Sadegh Hedayat

The Blind Owl is Sadegh Hedayat's magnum opus and a major literary work of 20th-century Iran. Written in Persian, it is narrated by an unnamed pen case painter, who addresses his murderous confessions to a shadow on his wall that resembles an owl. His confessions do not follow a linear progression of events and often repeat and layer themselves thematically, thus lending to the open-ended nature of interpretation of the story.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jennifer Haigh</span> American novelist and short story writer (born 1968)

Jennifer Haigh is an American novelist and short story writer in the realist tradition. Her work has been compared to that of Richard Ford, Richard Price and Richard Russo.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Al Young</span> American poet, novelist, essayist, screenwriter (1939–2021)

Albert James Young was an American poet, novelist, essayist, screenwriter, and professor. He was named Poet Laureate of California by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger from 2005 to 2008. Young's many books included novels, collections of poetry, essays, and memoirs. His work appeared in literary journals and magazines including Paris Review, Ploughshares, Essence, The New York Times, Chicago Review, Seattle Review, Brilliant Corners: A Journal of Jazz & Literature, Chelsea, Rolling Stone, Gathering of the Tribes, and in anthologies including the Norton Anthology of African American Literature, and the Oxford Anthology of African American Literature.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ved Mehta</span> Indian-American writer (1934-2021)

Ved Parkash Mehta was an Indian-born writer who lived and worked mainly in the United States. Blind from an early age, Mehta is best known for an autobiography published in installments from 1972 to 2004. He wrote for The New Yorker for many years.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Golden Theatre</span> Broadway theater in Manhattan, New York

The John Golden Theatre, formerly the Theatre Masque and Masque Theater, is a Broadway theater at 252 West 45th Street in the Theater District of Midtown Manhattan in New York City. Opened in 1927, the Golden Theatre was designed by Herbert J. Krapp in a Spanish style and was built for real-estate developer Irwin S. Chanin. It has 800 seats across two levels and is operated by the Shubert Organization. Both the facade and the auditorium interior are New York City landmarks.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Leila Aboulela</span> Sudanese writer (born 1964)

Leila Fuad Aboulela is a fiction writer, essayist, and playwright of Sudanese origin based in Aberdeen, Scotland. She grew up in Khartoum, Sudan, and moved to Scotland in 1990 where she began her literary career. Until 2023, Aboulela has published six novels and several short stories, which have been translated into fifteen languages. Her most popular novels, Minaret (2005) and The Translator (1999) both feature the stories of Muslim women in the UK and were longlisted for the International Dublin Literary Award and Orange Prize. Aboulela's works have been included in publications such as Harper's Magazine, Granta, The Washington Post and The Guardian. BBC Radio has adapted her work extensively and broadcast a number of her plays, including The Insider, The Mystic Life and the historical drama The Lion of Chechnya. The five-part radio serialization of her 1999 novel The Translator was short-listed for the Race In the Media Award (RIMA).

Beekman Place is a small street located in the Turtle Bay neighborhood on the East Side of Manhattan, New York City. Running from north to south for two blocks, the street is situated between the eastern end of 51st Street and Mitchell Place, where it ends at a retaining wall above 49th Street, overlooking the glass apartment towers at 860 and 870 United Nations Plaza, just north of the headquarters of the United Nations. "Beekman Place" also refers to the small residential enclave that surrounds the street itself. It is named after the Beekman family, who were influential in New York City's development.

<i>The New York Times Book Review</i> Weekly review of books by The New York Times

The New York Times Book Review (NYTBR) is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to the Sunday edition of The New York Times in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely read book review publications in the industry. The magazine's offices are located near Times Square in New York City.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Homa Katouzian</span>

Homa Katouzian is an economist, historian, sociologist and literary critic, with a special interest in Iranian studies. Katouzian's formal academic training was in economics and the social sciences but he concurrently continued his studies of Persian history and literature at a professional academic level. He began studying the life and works of the modern Persian writer, Sadeq Hedayat, and that of the Prime Minister of Iran in the early 1950s, Mohammad Mosaddeq, while still a faculty member in the department of economics at the University of Kent at Canterbury. Having taught economics at universities in Britain and other countries for eighteen years, he took voluntary retirement in 1986 to devote his entire time to Iranian studies. In recent years, he has been teaching and writing on classical Persian literature, in particular the 13th-century poet and writer, Sa‘di. Currently based at the University of Oxford, Katouzian is a member of the Faculty of Oriental Studies and the Roshan Institute Academic Visitor in Iranian Studies at St. Antony's College, where for thirteen years he edited the bimonthly Iranian Studies, the journal of the Association for Iranian Studies. He is editor of the International Journal of Persian Literature, and co-editor of Routledge's Iranian studies book series. He is also a former member of the editorial board of Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East and Comparative Economic Studies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Porochista Khakpour</span> American writer (born 1978)

Porochista Khakpour is an Iranian American novelist, essayist, and journalist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Clara Clemens</span> American; daughter of Mark Twain; opera singer

Clara Langhorne Clemens Samossoud, was an American concert singer, and the daughter of Samuel Clemens, who wrote as Mark Twain. She managed his estate and guarded his legacy after his death as his only surviving child. She was married first to Ossip Gabrilowitsch, then to Jacques Samossoud after Gabrilowitsch's death. She wrote biographies of Gabrilowitsch and of her father. In her later life, she became a Christian Scientist.

<i>Pastoralia</i> Collection by George Saunders published in 2000

Pastoralia is short story writer George Saunders’s second full-length short story collection, published in 2000. The collection received highly positive reviews from book critics and was ranked the fifth-greatest book of the 2000s by literary magazine The Millions. The book consists of stories that appeared in The New Yorker; most of the stories were O. Henry Prize Stories. The collection was a New York Times Notable Book for 2001.

<i>A Hologram for the King</i> 2012 novel by Dave Eggers

A Hologram for the King is a 2012 American novel written by Dave Eggers. In October 2012, the novel was announced as a finalist for the National Book Award.

Blinding Light is a 2005 novel by Paul Theroux.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Concert Grove</span> Section of Prospect Park in New York City

The Concert Grove is a section of Prospect Park, Brooklyn, New York City, that historically functioned as an outdoor music venue. It still serves as a sculpture garden lined with busts of musical figures, largely put up by German American Sängerfest participants and other cultural groups. The Concert Grove also includes the Concert Grove Pavilion, formerly known as the Oriental Pavilion, and adjoins a Lincoln sculpture facing the lake.

Hushidar "Hushi" Mortezaie is an Iranian-born American fashion designer, artist, collagist, and graphic designer. He co-founded the fashion label Michael and Hushi. Mortezaie is best known for his over-the-top Persian-aesthetic collaged textiles and fashion designs, often exploring glamour, politics, and kitsch. He has lived and worked in New York City, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.

The Iranian Students Association in the United States(ISAUS) was an American national student group for the Iranian diaspora, active from 1952 until the early 1980s. By the early 1960s, the group transformed into a significant portion of the membership of the Confederation of Iranian Students National Union (CISNU). The ISAUS was still active during the Iranian Revolution between 1977 and 1978, holding national protests and publishing information against Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.

References

  1. "Sons and Other Flammable Objects". SparkNotes . Retrieved 2023-11-28.
  2. Amiri, Cyrus; Govah, Mahdiyeh (September 22, 2021). "Hedayat's rebellious child: multicultural rewriting of The Blind Owl in Porochista Khakpour's Sons and Other Flammable Objects". British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies. 50 (2): 436–449. doi:10.1080/13530194.2021.1978279. ISSN   1353-0194. S2CID   240547754 . Retrieved November 21, 2021.
  3. "The 77th Annual California Book Awards: Featuring Michael Chabon & Khaled Hosseini - June 5, 2008". Upcoming.org Archive. Retrieved November 21, 2021.
  4. "Editor's Choice". The New York Times . September 16, 2007. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved November 21, 2021.
  5. Dickinson, Elizabeth Evitts (November 2008). "American Girl". Johns Hopkins Magazine. 60 (5). Retrieved November 21, 2021.
  6. Sons and other flammable objects. May 20, 2010. Retrieved November 21, 2021.{{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)
  7. Budnitz, Judy (September 9, 2007). "Family Baggage". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved November 21, 2021.
  8. Sons and Other Flammable Objects. Grove Atlantic Publisher. Retrieved November 21, 2021.