The Bridge of Isfahan Paperback – July 30, 2013

Small Press Bookwatch: October 2013James A. Cox, Editor-in-ChiefMidwest Book Review278 Orchard Drive, Oregon, WI 53575The Fiction ShelfThe Bridge of IsfahanNilla Cram Cook, authorBurning Daylight, Pearn and Associates, Inc.1600 Edora Court, Suite D Fort Collins, CO 80525Amy Opperman Cash (publicity)4936 Rt. 414, Burdett, NY 14818ISBN 978-09897242-9-6, $19.99, 256 pp., www.amazon.comSynopsis: "The Bridge of Isfahan" is a love story, set in Iran during the postwar 1940s, a time of burgeoning hopes and dangerous conflicts -- not the least among them the cold war. Shirene is the green-eyed granddaughter of the empress of Persia. Jamshid is the blue-eyed son of working class parents and an organizer for the socialist Tudeh Party. Shirene lives in the palatial Dove Tower near the ancient city of Isfahan, once the capital of Persia. She owns land and has feudal power over the local villagers. Jamshid has come to Isfahan to organize the local textile workers and to agitate against Shirene. They fall passionately in love with each other. "The Bridge of Isfahan" is also a feminist fantasy. On her mother's side, Shirene belongs to the matriarchal Baktiari Tribe -- women make the important decisions, and daughters are taught to throw knives and lassos and to ride stallions. Shirene must negotiate her way through perilous situations. In this she gets help from her formidable nurse, Haidah, and from her mother, Muluk, a deposed queen and devoted reader of the columns of the American journalist Dorothy Thompson.Critique: Author Nilla Cram Cook wrote "The Bridge of Isfahan A Persian Love Story" in the 1940s while working at the American Embassy in Teheran. Deftly edited for publication by her daughter Valentina Cook. "The Bridge of Isfahan" is a deftly woven, complex, timeless and thoroughly entertaining novel, making it emphatically recommended for personal reading lists and community library General Fiction collections.