Product Description

Zoya grew up during the wars that ravaged Afghanistan and lost both her parents in a bombing raid on Kabul. Zoya's story is of a young woman fighting a clandestine war of resistance against the Taliban at the risk of her own life. Having escaped in her teens to Pakistan where she now works tirelessly in a refugee camp, she also makes dangerous journeys back to her homeland to help the women oppressed by a regime that enforces the wearing of the stifling burqua, condones public stoning if they venture out without a male chaperone and absolutely forbids women's education or work. Zoya's story is a memoir that speaks louder than the images of devastation and outrage; it is a powerful message of optimism as she struggles to bring the plight of Afghan women to the world's attention.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #313120 in Books
• Published on: 2002-04-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 246 pages

Washington Post, March 1st 2002
A tale of struggle and suffering from a courageous freedom fighter ... Timely and sobering.

Unison magazine, April 2002
...a welcome and much needed account of one woman's resistance to the brutalities of The Taliban..a tale of great courage.
...essential reading.

The New York Times
Zoya's account...illuminates the clandestine resistance, first to the mujahedeen and then to the Taliban.

Customer Reviews

Makes me feel very small and materialistic
Although a shorter book than I would have liked, I was riveted from start to finish. This woman is amazing - the life she has led in the footsteps of her equally brave parents... supported by her wonderful auntie not to mention the amazing school she was sent to in Pakistan. A real insight into what life was like under the Taleban and the claustrophobia of the burqua in a world where showing an ankle wearing white socks could get you lashed to near-death.