Martyr!

By Kaveh Akbar

Book Overview

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - SHORTLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD - ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW'S 10 BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR - A TIME MUST-READ BOOK OF THE YEAR - A newly sober, orphaned son of Iranian immigrants, guided by the voices of artists, poets, and kings, embarks on a remarkable search for a family secret that leads him to a terminally ill painter living out her final days in the Brooklyn Museum. Electrifying, funny, and wholly original, Martyr heralds the arrival of an essential new voice in contemporary fiction.

"Kaveh Akbar is one of my favorite writers. Ever." --Tommy Orange, Pulitzer Prize-nominated author of There There

"The best novel you'll ever read about the joy of language, addiction, displacement, martyrdom, belonging, homesickness." --Lauren Groff, best-selling author of Matrix and Fates and Furies

Cyrus Shams is a young man grappling with an inheritance of violence and loss: his mother's plane was shot down over the skies of the Persian Gulf in a senseless accident; and his father's life in America was circumscribed by his work killing chickens at a factory farm in the Midwest. Cyrus is a drunk, an addict, and a poet, whose obsession with martyrs leads him to examine the mysteries of his past--toward an uncle who rode through Iranian battlefields dressed as the angel of death to inspire and comfort the dying, and toward his mother, through a painting discovered in a Brooklyn art gallery that suggests she may not have been who or what she seemed.

Kaveh Akbar's Martyr is a paean to how we spend our lives seeking meaning--in faith, art, ourselves, others.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0593685776
• ISBN13: 9780593685778
• Release Date: December 2024
• Publisher: Vintage
• Length: 352 Pages
• Weight: 0.64 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.3" x 8.1"

Customer Reviews

Fascinating book

First read of Kavesh Akbar. Was hesitant because he's a poet. Glad I didn't let that stop me from buying Martyr. Not poetry it's a fascinating novel of a young Iranian man and his father who live in America. Love the dad. Author took a topic that scares the hell out of Americans using laughter and great characters to win your heart over. Not about war in Isreal just about life in America. This young man can write. Highly recommend.