RR #1 Persepolis

Persepolis is a unique book from the get go, with it's comic book format and interesting plot it can be easily seen as an easy read. The novel takes place in 1980 Iran where the main character Marjane Satrapi is a young schoolgirl in the midst of the Islamic Revolution. At the start of the novel young Marjane is quite convinced she is the next prophet, and devotes much of her time educating herself through reading historical books about past prophets, leaders and history itself. However with the greater the danger in the country and the more protests, she finds herself straying from her talks with her God as well as what she thought was her immanent fate of being a prophet.  She finds herself fascinated with the protests and asks regularly to participate in them with her parents, though the answer she always receives is no. However once, along with her maid, she sets off to go to a protest herself, which led to her punishment due to the fact it was on Black Friday. A day in which they should have not been protesting.  By paying great attention to the happenings in her country as well as bombarding her parents frequently with questions she finds out that her grandfather was in fact a prince. That news send her imagination running and off to tell her friends at school who liked to brag about who's parent or relative was more of a hero. The novelty of that fades as more important matters take over and she starts to realize the different social classes in Iran. This made her ashamed of her fathers fancy Cadillac or even that her family has a maid. Thinking of her maid brought back memories of when her maid, Mehri, fell in love with the neighbor boy and lied telling him that she was in fact Marjane's sister. Marjane helped her write letters to him since she was illiterate but when it was founded out they were both in trouble. Upon inquiring why it was so wrong that Mehri and this neighbor be together her father told her that one must stay in the social class, so being a maid Mehri must marry someone in the same class as her own. She finds herself conflicted in what to believe when school tells her one thing and her parents say another. All of these parts of society she was finding out left Marjane disgusted with certain aspects of the way things were and believed they should be changed yet still she neglected her talks with God and the fate she thought she was destined to was pushed to the back of her mind. So far this is an excellent coming of age novel, set in a ever changing environment due to the political turmoil leaving the reader engaged throughout their reading. I find myself looking forward to finishing this book and seeing what is next in the Islamic evolution as well as how the world changes through Marjane's perspective.