A Book In Review: The Dressmaker of Khair Khana

Hello everyone!  I hope you are enjoying the week and hopefully having some great fall weather.  If however you find yourself wondering what to do while you relax in the sunshine or snuggle up on the couch on a rainy day, boy do I have a fantastic idea!  Head down to your local library or bookstore and pick up The Dressmaker of Khair Khana by Gayle Tzemach Lemmon.

I recently took this book on vacation and finished the whole thing on the airplane.  It was incredibly well written and eye opening on what life has been like for women in Afghanistan.  It is a true account of one woman, her family and community as they fight, behind a veil, to survive when the Taliban take over Afghanistan.  I'm not quite sure what I thought life was like for the women of Afghanistan, but it certainly wasn't what I learned from this book.  Kamila's story is inspiring in so many ways, but most of all is the importance it places on building a better life within our own communities.  Sometimes the only people you can rely on are the ones you see every day.  Her family fought to provide food, safety and shelter for themselves when the men in their lives went in search of work in different countries or recruited, by force, by the Taliban.  Leaving the women on their own, they were forced to be creative in how they could make money to provide for their families without being detected by the Talib enforcers.

I was not disappointed in this book and hope that you will find it as inspiring and eye opening as I did.

~Trisha