To see and see again

by Tara Bahrampour

To See and See Again traces three generations of an Iranian family undergoing a century of change - from her grandfather, a feudal lord with two wives; to her father, a free-spirited architect who marries an American pop singer; to Bahrampour herself, who grows up balanced precariously between two cultures and comes of age watching them clash on the nightly news. Bahrampour describes the exotic Iran of her childhood, leading up to the revolution, during which her family participates in mass demonstrations and takes cover from gunshots echoing over their garden wall. Afterward, shell-shocked, they struggle to rebuild their life in the United States. Returning to post-revolution Iran, Bahrampour attends secret parties where young Tehranis play out modern courtships; she is detained by police for talking to foreigners; and she visits her grandfather's lost feudal empire, where traces of her family history survive in the crumbling fortresses and jagged mountains of central Iran.