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Copy/paste the text below into your blog. <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9516.Persepolis_The_Story_of_a_Childhood?utm_medium=api&amp;utm_source=blog_review" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px"><img alt="Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood" border="0" src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/photo.goodreads.com/books/1166022598m/9516.jpg" /></a> <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9516.Persepolis_The_Story_of_a_Childhood?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood</a> by <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6238.Marjane_Satrapi">Marjane Satrapi</a><br/><br/> <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/21236910?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review"><h3>My review</h3></a> rating: 4 of 5 stars<br/>I can certainly see why Satrapi's graphic novel has received such high praise from such high places. Her art is primitive, yet sometimes exotic, as when she depicts the republican protestors of the Shah's era as repeating a motif of the same drowsy mustachioed man. These panels remind of something out of Martin Ramirez, but more controlled, less schizophrenic. At other times, her broad swathes of black and thick white lines remind me of Picasso - her forced perspective like pottery decoration. <br/> <br/>Little Marjane's story is less compelling than I was expecting, but Satrapi frames this story in such a vividly rendered history of Iran, that this might be less of a fault and more of a device to show the mundane, the ordinariness of life during wartime. Marjane is normal egocentric child, concerned at the same time about her singular family history and about pop music and jean jackets. She experiences the same development any American child goes through - cigarettes, boys, books, fear and cruelty. That might be the reason this book has received such wide praise in the West. It demystifies and personalizes a region of the world many think of as scary and alien. <br/> <br/>Satrapi uses the stories of her family, especially her uncle Anoosh, to show the viciousness, first of the Shah's regime, then of the Islamic revolution. At points it seems like she is begging the question - "Is it better to live under fascism or populist religious zealotry?" They're both shown to be pretty horrible and the fact that the only solution for those Iranians fortunate enough to have the option is to get out of the country, is disheartening to say the least. Iran embodies the two major struggles of the 20th and now 21st century - capitalism versus socialism, and secularism versus religious fundamentalism. <br/> <br/>I'm looking forward to Volume 2 and also the animated film. <br/><br/><a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/42934?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">View all my reviews.</a>