Monday, October 3, 2011

The American Granddaughter

As mentioned in the previous post, the late Noha Radi's Baghdad Diaries educated me on what the embargo was doing to the Iraqi people. Riverbend's amazing blog and book Baghdad Burning was pivotal in exposing the true face of the invasion.  

The American Granddaughter novel by Iraqi Inaam Kachachi, completes the picture, and is extremely valuable in highlighting the history, the dreams, and the lives of  important sectors of the Iraqi people, that is the Assyrians, the Chaldeans, and the Shiites.

The novel is also unique in showing the American invasion of Iraq from the point of view of an Iraqi American returning to her homeland as an interpreter working for the invading forces. It's true that she took the job for the money, but she went there convinced that she was helping rebuild her homeland. 

If Zaina was successful, at least for a while, in deceiving herself about the truth of her mission and that being a part of the invading army could also mean that she is on the side of the Iraqi people, her grandmother was too wise and too proper to accept that.

Zaina's love for her grandmother, her forbidden love to her milk brother Muhaymen, and what she saw with her own eyes throughout her mission in Iraq has finally made her sadder but wiser.

No comments: