Tehran At Twilight

"Abdoh paints a gripping portrait of a nation awash in violence and crippled by corruption.... Captivating."
--Publishers Weekly

"Abdoh...gives readers a visceral sense of life in a country where repression is the norm, someone is always watching, and your past is never really past. Recommended for espionage aficionados and for readers who enjoy international settings."
--Library Journal

Included Library Journal's "Books That Buzzed at BEA" Roundup, the first word on titles and trends from Barbara Hoffert, Editor

Included in Publishers Weekly's Fall Preview (Literary Fiction)

"Abdoh deftly captures the uneasy atmosphere of 2008 Tehran, swirling with betrayal and corruption."
--Library Journal, Books for the Masses/Editors' Picks BEA 2014

"Tehran at Twilight is a remarkable meditation on violence, and on all the ways one bears witness to pain... At the center lies the story of two friends whose paths have diverged, and of love restored between a mother and a son. A smart, eloquent novel."
--Dalia Sofer, author of The Septembers of Shiraz

"Connecting the dots of the shadow lives of Iranian, American, and Iranian American double and triple agents, and their double and triple stories in Iran and Manhattan, Baghdad and Berkeley, Abdoh also tells a tale of mothers and sons, using espionage for infrared insight into concealed identities. The startling truth embedded in this tight novel: We Are All Iranians."
--Brad Gooch, author of City Poet: The Life and Times of Frank O'Hara

"Tehran--bloated, capricious, corrupt, and with its various secret police agencies competing against one another--becomes a ripe setting for this roman noir... Move over Scandinavia: there?s a new kid on the noir block."
--Hooman Majd, author of The Ministry of Guidance Invites You to Not Stay

"A smart political thriller for our modern times."
--Laila Lalami, author of Secret Son

The year is 2008. Reza Malek's life is modest but manageable--he lives in a small apartment in Harlem, teaches "creative reportage" at a local university, and is relieved to be far from the blood and turmoil of Iraq and Afghanistan where he worked as a reporter, interpreter, and sometime lover for a superstar journalist who has long since moved on to more remarkable men.

After a terse phone call from his best friend in Iran, Sina Vafa, Reza reluctantly returns to Tehran. Once there, he finds far more than he bargained for: the city is on the edge of revolution; his friend Sina is embroiled with Shia militants; his missing mother, who was alleged to have run off with a lover before the revolution, is alive and well--while his own life is in danger.

Against a backdrop of corrupt clerics, shady fixers, political repression, and the ever-present threat of violence, Abdoh offers a telling glimpse into contemporary Tehran, and spins a compelling morality tale of identity and exile, the bonds of friendship, and the limits of loyalty.