The Stationery Shop

the long version

"A novel set in 1953 Tehran, against the backdrop of the Iranian Coup, about a young couple in love who are separated on the eve of their marriage, and who are reunited sixty years later, after having moved on to live independent lives in America, to discover the truth about what happened on that fateful day in the town square"-- 1953, Tehran. Amidst the political upheaval of the time, Roya finds an oasis in kindly Mr. Fakhri's book and stationery shop. When he introduces Roya to his other favorite customer-- handsome Bahman, who has a burning passion for justice and a love for Rumi's poetry-- she loses her heart at once. On the eve of their marriage, violence erupts. In the chaos of the coup d'etat, Bahman never shows, and Roya moves on to a life in the U.S. More than sixty years later, an accident of fate leads her back to Bahman and offers her a chance to ask him the questions that have haunted her for more than half a century: Why did he leave? Where did he go? How was he able to forget her? -- adapted from jacket