(Radio Iowa) – The debut novel from a University of Iowa creative writing instructor has cracked the New York Times’ best-seller list and Kaveh Akbar will headline the Celebration of Literary Arts in the Des Moines metro today.
The book “Martyr!” is fictional but follows the true-life 1988 American downing of an Iranian passenger jet that killed 290 civilians. The main character is the son of a woman who was killed in the crash. Akbar peppers the tragedy with humor, saying it’s “a serious book about international relations and death and martyrdom and art, but it’s also a book that has long dialogues with Lisa Simpson and Kareem Abdul Jabbar.”
The 35-year-old was born in Tehran, Iran, to an Iranian father and an American mother. They moved to the U-S when he was two. Akbar is starting his third year of teaching at the U-I. “Martyr!” was said to be on former President Obama’s summer reading list and it’s winning wide critical acclaim.
