Everything Sad Is Untrue by Daniel Nayeri | GGP Online Book Club

Please join us on Tuesday, February 2, 2021 at 7 PM PST for a GGP Online Book Club discussion of Everything Sad Is Untrue by Daniel Nayeri.

The Zoom meeting will be at https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88666921359,

You can order a print copy at http://bit.ly/ggpEverythingSadIsUntrue or in audiobook from Libro.fm, GGP’s audiobook partner, at http://bit.ly/EverythingSadAB.

Staff Reviews

A true refugee story told in a Scheherazade-like format. It’s the most engrossing book I’ve read this year: it’s magical, haunting, uplifting, funny, and sad all at once. I love this boy and I loved learning about his Iranian childhood and one-of-a-kind immigrant experience in Oklahoma. A MUST READ!

— Donna

One of my Top 3 Books of 2020: a rich history of a young Iranian refugee making a life in Oklahoma, his relationship with his parents, and finding an identity.

— Amy

One of my Top 3 Books of 2020: This beautiful book made me laugh and cry. I listened to the audiobook, and the narrator’s voice is everything. He uses humor and myths to tell the tale of his Iranian family settling in Oklahoma and though it was written for kids, it is great for all ages.

— Sarah

Description

At the front of a middle school classroom in Oklahoma, a boy named Khosrou (whom everyone calls “Daniel”) stands, trying to tell a story. His story. But no one believes a word he says. To them he is a dark-skinned, hairy-armed boy with a big butt whose lunch smells funny; who makes things up and talks about poop too much.

But Khosrou’s stories, stretching back years, and decades, and centuries, are beautiful, and terrifying, from the moment his family fled Iran in the middle of the night with the secret police moments behind them, back to the sad, cement refugee camps of Italy.and further back to the fields near the river Aras, where rain-soaked flowers bled red like the yolk of sunset burst over everything, and further back still to the Jasmine-scented city of Isfahan.

We bounce between a school bus of kids armed with paper clip missiles and spitballs to the heroines and heroes of Khosrou’s family’s past, who ate pastries that made people weep and cry “Akh, Tamar!” and touched carpets woven with precious gems.

Like Scheherazade in a hostile classroom, Daniel weaves a tale to save his own life: to stake his claim to the truth. And it is (a true story).

It is Daniel’s.

About the Author

Daniel Nayeri was born in Iran and spent a couple of years as a refugee before immigrating to Oklahoma at age eight with his family. He is the publisher of Odd Dot, an imprint of Macmillan, making him one of the youngest publishers in the industry. He has served on the CBC diversity committee and the CBC panel committee.