Promotional Information

This explosive, controversial and moving short novel - winner of France's prestigious Goncourt Prize - is a compelling look behind the veil that confronts taboos of female oppression and sexuality

About the Author

Born in Afghanistan in 1962, Atiq Rahimi fled to France in 1984. There he has made a name as a writer, film and documentary maker of exceptional note. The film of his first novel, Earth and Ashes, was in the Official Selection at Cannes, 2004. He is adapting his second novel, A Thousand Rooms of Dream and Fear, for the screen. Since 2001, he has returned to Afghanistan many times to set up a Writers' House in Kabul and offer support and training to young writers and film-makers. He lives in Paris.

Reviews

A deceptively simple book, written in a spare, poetic style. But it is a rich read... It is without doubt an important and courageous book
*Khaled Hosseini, author of The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns*

This is a remarkable novel, written with a beautiful lucidity... it is a book which achieves what imaginative literature can provide better than any art form: it makes you think and feel at the same time
*Scotsman*

An important and shocking polemic; it will outrage readers for the truths it reveals
*The Irish Times*

We know so little about the day-to-day life of people in Afghanistan - and in particular its women - that glittering gems such as this ... become all the more valuable for shining a torch on a beleaguered and largely unseen existence
*Metro*

Her monologue is a direct attempt on the part of Rahimi to rip away the veil over Afghan women's lives... An act of political courage and a beautifully constructed, deeply memorable novella
*Observer*

Perfectly written
*Los Angeles Times*

Powerful... truly an expansive work of literature
*New York Post*

One thinks of Marguerite Duras, the plays of Sartre, the absurdity of Samuel Beckett, even of Ernest Hemingway. Strangely beautiful, poignant, by turns light and serious... The Patience Stone is one of those rare novels which make time elastic; too short, it can be read in one go, yet it never leaves you
*Lire*

An astonishing writer: this book is another brilliant triumph
*Nadeem Aslam*

Rich in symbolism
*Times Literary Supplement*

Rahimi (Earth and Ashes) won the 2008 Prix Goncourt for this brief, melodramatic novel set amid factional violence "somewhere in Afghanistan or elsewhere." It follows the circumscribed movements of a Muslim woman largely confined to the house where she nurses her comatose husband, who's been shot by a fellow jihadist. A humorless, inflammatory mullah pays the woman unwelcome visits, and sexually menacing soldiers break into her house. Though such events generate tension and drama, the novel's cultural and historical milieu lacks specificity, and Rahimi may have erred in sketching the story's political context vaguely. For some readers, his intimate attention to objects and spaces may compensate for the grating confessional tenor that develops later, when the narrator divulges damning secrets to her husband's unresponsive body and fulfilling the book's premise a little too obviously by referring to him as her "patience stone." McLean's translation is faultless, but the narrator's reminiscences feel stilted; the patience-stone conceit borders on gimmickry; and incidents of a violent or sexual nature seem overdetermined. (Jan.) Copyright 2009 Reed Business Information.

A deceptively simple book, written in a spare, poetic style. But it is a rich read... It is without doubt an important and courageous book -- Khaled Hosseini, author of The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns
This is a remarkable novel, written with a beautiful lucidity... it is a book which achieves what imaginative literature can provide better than any art form: it makes you think and feel at the same time -- Allan Massie * Scotsman *
An important and shocking polemic; it will outrage readers for the truths it reveals -- Eileen Battersby * The Irish Times *
We know so little about the day-to-day life of people in Afghanistan - and in particular its women - that glittering gems such as this ... become all the more valuable for shining a torch on a beleaguered and largely unseen existence * Metro *
Her monologue is a direct attempt on the part of Rahimi to rip away the veil over Afghan women's lives... An act of political courage and a beautifully constructed, deeply memorable novella * Observer *