A Golden Age

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This, her debut novel, is set in 1971 in East Pakistan, where Rehana Haque, a young widow, is throwing a party. This was not because Rehana wanted to do it for her country, she did the things she did, for her kids. Rehana felt like a fully fleshed-out, flawed and multi-faceted character, as she trod her precarious path though life, but Rehana’s friends could seem more emblematic, while the guerrilla soldier who becomes important to Rehana felt positively wraithlike. In many ways, Reena is an everywoman as she struggles to keep what remains of her family together and alive. She is a single mother; her children are in their late teens and are part of the struggle for independence.

But civil conflict is brewing, a conflict that will lead to Bangladeshi independence, but will also lead to terrible violence and countless individual tragedies. This kind of generosity, characteristic of Rehana, and, in my real life and literary experience, par for the course among Muslims, is striking and moving to me.My Bangladeshi friend in our book group was bothered by what she saw as a lot of inaccuracies about the history and culture.

Anam grew up in Bangladesh and she has drawn on the stories told her by her parents who were both freedom fighters in Bangladesh’s War of Independence. It provides an account of the heart-breaking decisions that families may be forced to make in wartime, about sacrifice and the toll of conflict and the particular cruelties of civil war. Yet, her novel which is set mainly in Dhaka during 1971 gave me the feeling that she had been an eye-witness of those troubled times. The first third was a bit slow and harder to get through, with the confusing characters and historical situation. Rehana is a wonderful character, loving but flawed, and gifted with depths and strengths I would never have expected in the early part of the the book.I'm making it my off-duty duty to experience FIVE books, FIVE films, art, TV, music and food from every country in the world (where feasible). Anam has set her story mostly in the revolution that saw Bengal split from Pakistan to become Bangladesh. It is the story of a family, of a mother who had given up her children (but not really) and of her children's political activities for their blossoming country.