★★☆☆☆
I was very excited for this book. Tough stories from places far away with people that face great difficulty always interest me. It is as if I am given the gift of a window that opens up to a world that is very much not my own and I am humbled to look through it. Pardis Mahdavi’s story is not an easy one as she faced much oppression and opposition by living in Iran in the early 2000’s, by being a woman, a feminist, an American, and a journalist. She is obviously passionate about women’s rights, feminism, about exposing the underbelly of human trafficking in the Middle East, about showcasing the many brave people that move around unrecognized, sacrificing their own safety and livelihoods to help others that are oppressed.
That being said, I did not like her memoir. I recognize her life story, all that she has been through and all she has done, but if I am to look at this memoir objectively, as a book, it is not a very good one. Disclaimer: I did receive an Advanced Readers Copy of This Goes Out to the Underground some time ago (December 2021, to be exact) so some of the issues I am about to mention might have been amended prior to publishing. It felt as if it severely lacked an editor as the writing felt amateurish and repetitive. Some characters felt awfully cartoonish, and others appeared or were introduced out of nowhere. We moved quickly through Pardis’s life – from the time she went to Iran for the first time when she was 19, to when she was back in the United States in her late 20s and early 30s after being arrested and ostracized by the Iranian government.
While the first half of the memoir focused on her time in Iran, the second half of the book focused on Pardis’s relationship with her first husband and the father of her eldest daughter. Very often (very, very often, to the point of tedium) she said she was a feminist, and it was a surprise to all (her family and the reader) when she decided to get married to a man she hardly seemed to know. I wish she spent more time on when she met her first husband and their budding relationship. He was not a very good person, obviously, and probably not worth her time while writing the book, however, I would have liked to know what drew him to her in the first place. Those first moments of their relationship were sorely missed.
Again, I fully understand that this is a memoir, somebody’s real-life experiences and stories, so I don’t want to expect too much. But as I reader, I found it hard to connect with her or the moments of her life, even though I greatly wanted to.
If you would like to see a glimpse of what Iran was like in the early 2000’s, and learn how the horrid practice of human trafficking affects women, men and children in the Middle East and worldwide, I think this would be a good place to start. It seems like Pardis has written other books on the subjects, so they might be a good place to continue. Sadly though, I cannot recommend This Goes out to the Underground, though that might be only due to my own personal taste in writing.
I received an ARC of This Goes Out to the Underground from NetGalley. I want to thank Hachette Books for providing me with a copy.
This Goes Out to the Underground on Goodreads.
Buy This Goes out to the Underground on Amazon on July 26th, 2022.
The Reluctant Reader 