BookBrowse Reviews The Lion Women of Tehran by Marjan Kamali

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Set against the backdrop of Iran's turbulent twentieth century and spanning decades, The Lion Women of Tehran chronicles a story of betrayal and redemption between two best friends, Ellie and Homa.

Seven-year-old Ellie, living in Tehran in the 1950s, has just lost her father. She and her single mother are forced to leave their lavish life behind and move to a tiny home downtown. Grieving her father and struggling to cope with the outbursts of her proud and volatile mother, Ellie fantasizes about the best friend she will meet when she starts school: a polite, sweet girl with whom she can share her secrets. The wild, brash Homa is hardly who she has in mind, but after a rocky start, the girls become inseparable despite the protests of Ellie's mother, who fears that Homa, with her working-class background and communist father, will be a bad influence on Ellie.

When Ellie's mother remarries and relocates the family back uptown, regaining their former social status, Ellie and Homa lose touch. Later, Homa transfers to Ellie's high school, and Ellie, now rich and popular, is mortified when Homa makes no effort to fit in with their classmates as she has. Nevertheless, Homa soon charms her way back into Ellie's life. As the two girls grow up together, Ellie finds that she admires her friend's fearlessness and political activism, but while Homa gets involved with a communist organization at university, all Ellie can do is think about her engagement and dream about being a wife and a mother. Ellie's naivety ends up having dire consequences when an error in judgment puts Homa's life in danger, altering the course of both girls' lives.

Set during a particularly turbulent period of Iranian history, The Lion Women of Tehran highlights the growing conflict between those like Ellie's mother who support the royal family, and those like Homa's father who advocate for Mohammad Reza Shah's deposition. But when the Shah is overthrown by the 1979 Iranian Revolution, the religious extremists who take power plunge the entire country into a period of darkness that is only exacerbated by the Iran-Iraq War of 1980-1988.

Author Marjan Kamali distills Iran's complex contemporary history into a compelling narrative that centers on the intertwined lives of the two main characters. In emphasizing the contrast in the girls' upbringings, Kamali presents the reader with a multifaceted picture of Iran, and as personal and political conflicts build, she underscores how the differences between Ellie and Homa are not nearly as significant as their similarities as women living and surviving in a systemically misogynistic society.

There are a few moments where the novel could have used sharper editing—dialogue about narcissism and emotional abuse feels anachronistically articulate for the 1980s; a final confrontation between Ellie and Homa is brought on by an event whose melodrama feels silly. The last few chapters almost abandon the narrative in favor of acting as a manifesto for women's rights in Iran—and while the author's passion for this important subject shines through, it feels a little shoehorned in rather than serving as a logical culmination of Ellie and Homa's story.

But on the whole, this is a gripping, eye-opening narrative about a fascinating period of Iranian history, that tells the story of two complicated, bright young women who are committed to fighting for each other through numerous personal challenges and moments of political upheaval.

This review first ran in the December 4, 2024 issue of BookBrowse Recommends.

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