Dimensions
144 x 224 x 20mm
Aria Minu-Sepehr was raised in a sheltered world of extraordinary privilege, the son of a high-ranking general in the Shah’s Imperial Iranian Air Force. But when King Reza Kahn was overthrown and the Ayatollah rose to power in 1979, Aria’s privileged boyhood skidded to a halt. His life became a terrifying waiting game—waiting to see if soldiers would invade his home, waiting to see if his family would have to flee, waiting to find out if his father would come home alive each night. Aria’s childhood worries about school exams and making mischief at home were quickly replaced by the terror that his father could be publicly assassinated, that he himself could be kidnapped, and the very real possibility that the family would not be allowed to leave the country alive.
We Heard the Heavens Then is an exceptional memoir about the clash of modernity and religion in Iran, as seen through the eyes of a boy with unusual access to both two sides. Exquisitely drawn from childhood and enhanced by his adult perspective, We Heard the Heavens Then is Aria Minu-Sepehr’s unforgettable account of coming of age in a nation as it slipped away. -
