Come Back To Afghanistan

"Akbar's refreshingly unsentimental reminiscences of visiting his father's homeland as a teen make for an intriguing portrait of Afghanistan at a time of significant transition. On 9/11, Akbar, who was born in Peshawar in 1984 but grew up in the U.S., was living near Oakland, Calif., where his father ran a clothing store. After the attack, the elder Akbar, a descendant of an Afghan political family, returned to his country to take a job as President Hamid Karzai's chief spokesman and, later, as governor of Kunar, a rural province. The author visited his father for three successive summers, and the result is this account, a closeup view of the creation of the country's post-Taliban democratic government, told from a perspective that's impressively both insider and objective. Akbar reports on chats with cabinet ministers and warlords, and sketches the lay of the land, visiting both sumptuous Kabul palaces as well as bombed-out villages. His youth and curiosity send him on some dangerous adventures (he retraces a mountain route between Afghanistan and Pakistan used by fleeing members of al-Qaeda and the Taliban), and that youthful flavor also infuses the writing with a hip stream-of-consciousness that is by turns funny, insightful and, occasionally, breathtaking. Agent, Jud Laghi. (Nov.)" Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

In 2002, Akbar, then 17 and a high school senior in suburban California, skipped his prom and graduation and traveled to his parents' native Afghanistan for the first time. The historic events and changes Akbar witnessed over the next three summers became an award-winning series of radio documentaries and now this memoir, in which Akbar blends his own story with that of the political and civilian drama taking place in post-Taliban Afghanistan. The volume has no index. Annotation ©2006 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

The intimate and riveting chronicle of an extraordinarily courageous Afghan-American teenager coming of age in post-9/11 Afghanistan. Building on two acclaimed radio documentaries aired on This American Life, Hyder Akbar tells how his ordinary suburban California life was turned upside-down after 9/11. Hyder's father, a scion of an Afghan political family, sold his business--a hip-hop clothing store in Oakland--and left for Afghanistan, where he became President Hamid Karzai's chief spokesman and later, the governor of Kunar, a rural province. Obsessed since youth with a country he had never even visited, seventeen-year-old Hyder convinced his father to let him join him on three successive summers. Working alongside his father at the presidential palace and in Kunar has given Hyder a rare front-row seat at the creation of democratic government in Afghanistan. In Come Back to Afghanistan, Hyder interweaves his personal journey--a teenager struggling with his identity in his parents' homeland--with a dramatic behind-the-scenes account of political and civilian life in post-Taliban Afghanistan. Uncommonly wise and insightful, Hyder travels from palaces to prisons and from Kabul to the borderlands, revealing Afghanistan as readers have never seen or understood it before. Said Hyder Akbar is currently a college student. He is also the co-director and founder of his own non-governmental organization, Wadan Afghanistan, which has rebuilt schools and constructed pipe systems in rural Kunar province. Susan Burton is a contributing editor of This American Life, and a former editor at Harper's. Her writing appears in the New York Times Magazine. A YALSA Top Ten Best Book for Young Adults Said Hyder Akbar was living an extraordinary suburban life in California when the shocking events of September 11, 2001, turned his world upside down. After the fall of the Taliban, Hyder's father, a scion of an Afghan political family, sold his business--a hip-hop clothing store in Oakland--and left for Afghanistan, where he became President Hamid Karzai's chief spokesman. Obsessed since youth with a country he had never even visited, seventeen-year-old Hyder convinced his father to let him join him during three successive summer vacations. In Afghanistan, Hyder witnessed a scarred county at a time of radical change, its hope for the future marred by blood feuds, poverty, and divided loyalties. Working alongside his father in the presidential palace gave Hyder a front-row seat at the creation of Afghanistan's first post-Taliban government. Later, Hyder's father was appointed governor of Kunar, a volatile province that borders Pakistan. There, Hyder observed a world few Americans get to see, at one point serving as a translator at the secret U.S. military interrogation of a suspected terrorist who later died in custody. Throughout his travels in Afghanistan, Hyder carried a minidisc recorder; he kept it rolling even as he ducked for cover on the floor of a U.S. military Humvee during a twenty-minute ambush. His radio documentaries, which aired on This American Life, have garnered several awards, including an Overseas Press Club citation. The immediacy of these recordings is captured in this book, in which Hyder interweaves this personal journey--a teenager struggling with his identity in his parents' homeland--with a dramatic behind-the-scenes account of political and civilian life in post-Taliban Afghanistan. An] engaging and informative account of Afghan life and politics interwoven with a teen's reactions to his first visit to his family's native land. Because of Hyder's] background and connections, his interest and knowledge of Afghan history and politics, and his language skills, Akbar was involved in his father's work in ways that most teens can only dream of. Readers are rewarded with an inside look at Afghan reconstruction that is both informative and appealing. The teen admires his father and his father's friends immensely; he dreams of being personally involved in nation-building. Readers will come away from this memoir with a strong desire to see into the young man's future and that of the country that has so entranced him.--School Library Journal, starred review Straddling cultures, Akbar presents an intimate portrait of a nation at a crossroads.--Conde Nast Traveler Said Hyder Akbar is so engaging, so funny, so different from everyone else who normally reports this kind of story, that Come Back to Afghanistan is irresistible. Hyder wanders around observing life and cracking jokes and translating for U.S. troops and getting shot at. He takes us to a place most of us would normally dread reading about, and by the end, we really care badly about what will happen next in Afghanistan. That's a rare and special thing.--Ira Glass, host and producer of This American Life Refreshingly candid, Akbar worries about Afghanistan's poverty but remains hopeful.--GQ Said Hyder Akbar's absorbing memoir of witnessing democracy's struggle in Afghanistan is both heartbreaking and hilarious. Akbar provides a wry, intimate account of the battle for the soul of Afghanistan. His book offers profound truths about U.S. policy in the Middle East from the sharp-eyed perspective of a young Afghan-American. Akbar nails the warped reality of present-day Afghanistan, offering a wild ride into the chasm between American and Afghan cultures being forcibly conjoined on Middle Eastern soil.--Evan Wright, author of Generation Kill Said Hyder Akbar is like the young Ibn Batuta, the great traveler of the medieval world, leaving the comforts of home to venture where few dare and sharing with his readers the treasures of his journey through his writings. Come Back to Afghanistan is our passport to the frontlines in the battle for the soul of Afghanistan. We're lucky Said Hyder Akbar made the trip for us.--Asra Nomani, author of Standing Alone in Mecca: An American Woman's Struggle for the Soul of Isla

Building on two acclaimed radio documentaries aired on "This American Life," this intimate and riveting chronicle is delivered by an extraordinarily courageous Afghan-American teenager coming of age in post 9/11 Afghanistan.

Said Hyder Akbar is currently a college student. He is also the co-director and founder of his own non-governmental organization, Wadan Afghanistan, which has rebuilt schools and constructed pipe systems in rural Kunar province. He is now twenty.

Susan Burton is a contributing editor of This American Life, and a former editor at Harpers. Her writing appears in the New York Times Magazine.