Critical Praise

"“Caspian Rain is a thrill to read. Heartbreak and hope fill the pages. Nahai delves deep into fear, love, jealousy, and obsession --- and with evocative language, and a rich and complex story, takes us to another culture."

—Brooklyn Rail

"Entrancing…Caspian Rain is a beautiful study in disappointment and ineffable loss, in the conflict between duty and desire. Nahai shows her characters just as they are, damaged. They are keenly aware of how they’d like to change their lives --- an of how limited their options really are."

—The Los Angeles Times

"Nahai’s power as a story-teller flows from her desire to weave the brutal fats of modern Iranian history with fantastic narratives of familial rupture and political displacement. American readers will be absorbed by [her] colorful evocation of the characters. From her clear-eyed yet deeply emphatic perch in the New World, Nahai sounds the emotional costs of exile as she explores the trauma of loss for her fellow émigrés. She is, after all, that subculture’s finest chronicler."

—Chicago Tribune

"Like drops of acid, Gina Nahai’s words burn the pages of this moving novel about the fate of women in pre-revolutionary Iran. Nahai’s alluring poetic style draws us into the lives of her female characters. We identify with their hopes and desires, but we also sense their frustration. Beneath the novel’s calm and captivating prose is a powerful testament to Iranian women’s fight against oppression."

—Ms. Magazine

"Nahai’s story of a haunted Jewish family in Tehran during the shah’s last years possesses the dark beauty and harsh lessons of a fairy tale. Nahai returns to the world she unveiled so sensitively in Moonlight on the Avenue of Faith to create a saga of morally bankrupt traditions and brutal class stratification. [Her] poetic and cathartic drama speaks for all women, for all who are tyrannized."

—Starred Review, Booklist

"Nahai’s fourth novel is both riveting family drama and compelling historical fiction. Richly detailed, emotionally intense, and tremendously moving, this work is highly recommended for all libraries."

—Starred Review, Library Journal

"The interlocking tales here read like myths. Nahai’s writing is compassionate even as it indicts."

—Los Angeles Magazine, Spotlight Review