Nawa deftly sketches the geopolitical nightmare that is today’s Afghanistan, but the book’s real strength is her detailed, sensitive reporting of individual people’s stories.” — Boston Globe
“Powerful. . . . Nawa draws rich, complex portraits of subjects on both sides of the law . . . Nawa’s work is remarkable for its depth, honesty, and commitment to recording women’s stories, even when it means putting her own safety at risk. She writes with passion about the history of her volatile homeland and with cautious optimism about its future.” — Publishers Weekly
“Nawa ably captures the tragic complexity of Afghan society and the sheer difficulty of life there. . . . Her assured narrative clearly stems from in-depth reporting in a risk-laden environment.” — Kirkus Reviews
“An insightful and informative look at the global challenge of Afghan drug trade. Fariba Nawa weaves her personal story of reconnecting with her homeland after 9/11 with a very engaging narrative that chronicles Afghanistan’s dangerous descent into opium trafficking, its impact on the U.S. campaign, and most revealingly, how the drug trade has damaged the lives of ordinary Afghan people.” — Khaled Hosseini, author of The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns
“Opium Nation brings much needed depth and complexity to any conversation involving Afghanistan and its future. Fariba Nawa writes with the detailed eye of a journalist, the warmth of a proud Afghan and the nuanced perspective of someone effortlessly straddling the East and the West. This book is a chance for readers to see Afghanistan and its people far beyond the coverage of the evening news.” — Firoozeh Dumas, author of Laughing Without an Accent and Funny in Farsi
“Journalists, policy makers, and scholars have written on the Afghan drug trade, but no one has shown its human drama and toll like Fariba Nawa. She takes us inside the families of a country shattered by war, surviving only by risking their lives — and daughters — for a criminal enterprise feeding the addictions of foreigners. Nawa offers a unique view of the human side of this conflict in which we are so deeply engaged.” — Barnett R. Rubin, author of The Fragmentation of Afghanistan
“Insightful and informative. . . . Fariba Nawa weaves her personal story of reconnecting with her homeland after 9/11 with a very engaging narrative that chronicles Afghanistan’s dangerous descent into opium trafficking . . . [and] how the drug trade has damaged the lives of ordinary Afghan people.” — Khaled Hosseini, author of The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns
“Opium Nation brings much needed depth and complexity to any conversation involving Afghanistan and its future. Fariba Nawa writes with the detailed eye of a journalist, the warmth of a proud Afghan and the nuanced perspective of someone effortlessly straddling the East and the West.” — Firoozeh Dumas, author of Laughing Without an Accent and Funny in Farsi
“Journalists, policy makers, and scholars have written on the Afghan drug trade, but no one has shown its human drama and toll like Fariba Nawa. [She] offers a unique view of the human side of this conflict in which we are so deeply engaged.” — Barnett R. Rubin, author of The Fragmentation of Afghanistan
This fusion of memoir and international reportage paints a disturbing picture of present-day Afghanistan as a tribal narco-state.
Journalist Nawa fled the country with her family as a young girl during the Soviet invasion, and only returned in 2000 as an American citizen working for a Pakistani think tank as an editor and journalist. She then spent several years traveling through the country and reporting on its transformations. Nawa is especially curious about the effects of increased opiate production on Afghan women, and her conclusions are grim: "...the Afghan drug trade provided funding for terrorists and for the Taliban... and [was] strengthening corrupt Afghan government officials whom the United States supported." The author portrays a disordered, cruel society in which a proud culture of intricate traditions has been repeatedly battered by historical conflicts--most recently, the disastrous American response to the Taliban and the explosion of narcotics culture. Afghan social structures seem built around the subjugation of women, and shady drug lords routinely demand marriage to debtors' female children as payment for opium debts, a circumstance equated with virtual slavery. Nawa met one such girl, a spirited and angry 12-year-old named Darya. The author traveled throughout the country in an attempt to understand the surreal circumstances contributing to Darya's plight, talking to rural farmers, anti-narcotics agents and dealers. Essentially, despite brutal risks, the rural poor are drawn to the opium industry due to tribal pressures and for want of better options. Nawa ably captures the tragic complexity of Afghan society and the sheer difficulty of life there. Although the dialogue sometimes feels reconstructed or artificial, her assured narrative clearly stems from in-depth reporting in a risk-laden environment.
Despite Nawa's forceful optimism, the author delivers a troubling indictment of the drug and anti-terror wars visited upon Afghanistan, and of certain reactionary aspects of Afghan culture.
