By Adib Khorram
This book is first of a series of 2 books.
It is about a teen named Darius Kellner, he is half Persian and half American. He suffers from clinical depression, a genetic one, passed from his father, Stephen Kellner. Speaking of it, though the son and dad can have this unique understanding of each other because what they are going through, it proves otherwise. Darius doesn’t have a very good relationship with his father.
Darius always becomes the ‘target’ of a bully named Trent Bolger, who makes sure passes some racist comment every time he walks past Darius. Though it irritates Darius and hurts him, he makes them get to him lesser by naming Trent and his friends with a comical nomenclature, which I love, soulless minions of orthodoxy.
When you can laugh about it, things seem less daunting.
And that is exactly how Darius copes with it, though it is not okay. He has a younger sister Laleh, who he loves a lot. Things change, when their family gets to know that Shirin’s father in Iran is suffering from an illness. The parents decide to take the children to see their grandparents in their native for the first time.
Though Darius talks to his grandparents in Skype, he is kind of overwhelmed and also he is not fluent in Farsi unlike his sister, which makes it easier for her to quickly connect with their relatives. Darius gets his first friend Sohrab in Iran. The road is not always smooth though for Darius.
I could go on and on about how this book highlights so many different aspects.
Be it the mentions of how depression makes you witness the world so differently everyday, be it the not knowing where do I fit in part, struggles with being a Fractional Persian, be it the beautiful friendship that blooms like a rose with its own thorns, be it the familial relationships and its complexities.
I loved how the author could portray all the beautiful things in very few pages and an etching story.
Oh yes, I did forget to mention Darius’s love for tea, which we share!
This was a totally new perspective I witnessed.
Rating: 4.8/5
Read the review of the sequel, Darius the Great deserves better
Featured image courtesy: penguinrandomhouse
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