Book Review: Veil of Roses

December 6, 2007

This book by Laura Fitzgerald tells the story of a young Iranian woman who is given a visa to visit America, and, if she finds a husband in three months, stay permanently. We follow Tami through her various tastes of freedom, from wearing high-heeled boots to ordering coffee to talking to men. Her older sister introduces her to several potential Iranian husbands, all with a fatal flaw of some sort. In the meantime, Tami meets and falls in love with an American man, and, well, it's all rather predictable. I think that Fitzgerald could have had a fantastic book if she hadn't tried to be funny and cute, but then I guess this wouldn't be categorized as "chick lit." The best parts of this book are when Fitzgerald is serious about the struggles of Iranian women. This is Fitzgerald's first novel, and I expect that she has the ability to write a solid, powerful novel. She'll just have to leave out the line-dancing scenes....

I did enjoy the book; it's just that I always feel a bit emotionally manipulated and cheap when I crave these mostly fluffy beach reads, you know? I think I hear Charlotte Mason whispering, "Twaddle" in my ear....(Yes, I know, she'd have stopped reading my twaddly blog a long time ago.)