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March 21, 2005
 
BOOK REVIEW: 'Lipstick Jihad' Deals with Family, Career Matters of a Young Iranian-American Journalist
 
Reviewed by David M. Kinchen
Huntington News Network Book Critic
 
Hinton (HNN) — You have to review the book the publisher sends you, not the one you'd like to see. That's part of my dilemma with Azadeh Moaveni's "Lipstick Jihad" (PublicAffairs, 249 pages, $25).
 
What probably started out as a book that would help explain today's Iran to American readers – a 21st Century equivalent of John Gunther's wonderfully readable "Inside" books or books by foreign correspondents attempting to explain the French, English or Russians, for example – morphed into a memoir. A memoir by someone born in 1976. Is the world ready for a memoir by a writer who isn't even 30 years old?
 
Moaveni was born in northern California's Silicon Valley to expatriate Iranians three years before the Islamic revolution and hostage crisis that came following the overthrow of the pro-American Shah of Iran. Her father is secular, much more so than her Shiite mother. The northern California Iranian diaspora is much smaller than the one in the Los Angeles area and Moaveni is quick – too quick, one might say – to belittle the Los Angeles Iranians. Expatriate and refugee Iranians, many of them wealthy, are so prevalent in Los Angeles that the Santa Monica Mountain range separating L.A. from the San Fernando Valley is jokingly called the "Iranian Alps."
 
The subtitle of the book – "A Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America and American in Iran" – reveals the conflict of this very talented young journalist, who now is a foreign correspondent for the Los Angeles Times, based in Beirut.
 
Part of the problem may be where she earned her undergraduate degree, the University of California at Santa Cruz. I don't want to pick on the UC system, but I just can't help it; the once great University of California system has become so politically correct and multiculturally fixated that it has lost its way. This is true of most of the so-called "prestige" public and private universities, not to mention lesser institutions of high learning like Ward Churchill's University of Colorado-Boulder.
 
Moaveni grew up a typical California girl in many respects, practicing yoga and listening to Madonna. She was proud of her Iranian heritage, but was aware that most of her "American" friends viewed the 1979 violent regime change in her ancestral homeland as a retreat back to the Dark Ages.
 
After studying Arabic in Cairo, Moaveni decided in 2000 to work for Time magazine as a reporter in Tehran, a decision that horrified many of her extended family in the San Jose area. Moaveni persisted and began a career as a reporter in a city and nation where she had to wear traditional – for women – garb and cover up in a way that must have grated on the California Girl part of her persona.
 
This was the most revealing section of the book for me – her two-year period reporting in a country that was far from a democracy, where uneducated 18-year-old kids could run around beating up people – especially more educated, wealthier people – in the name of Allah. She was spied on from the beginning, as one would expect of someone who after all was an American citizen in a country that still has no diplomatic relations with the U.S.
 
After a living and reporting in Iran, Moaveni realized that many of the Western stereotypes about Iran were true. The country had a measure of official freedom, but those 18-year-old enforcers of religious morals kept getting in the way of couples dating or just walking together. Moaveni herself was attacked, though not seriously injured, and her friends were also beaten, with the police doing little to intervene. She kept getting subtle and not-so-subtle sexual harassment from her minders. Even under a relative reformist moderate cleric like Mohammad Khatami, Iran was a living, breathing embodiment of the clash of civilizations.
 
Eventually, the conflicts of living in a less-than-free country overcame her pride in her heritage, wearing her down. Moaveni moved to another publication and an apartment in Beirut. She has covered Iraq and Afghanistan for the L.A. Times.
 
All in all, the book was worth reading. Moaveni reveals much about the conflicted young Iranians, who love much of Western culture despite the demonization of it by the theocracy that runs the country. I'm a believer in the view – paraphrasing Lord Acton – that religion corrupts and that absolute religion corrupts absolutely. I still haven't decided whether writing "Lipstick Jihad" in the form of a memoir was a good idea, but Moaveni is a compelling writer with a unique perspective on the two cultures that have formed her.
 
Publisher's Web Site: www.publicaffairsbooks.com
Author's Web Site: www.lipstickjihad.com

 Related: 
– Mother Jones: Q & A with Ms. Moaveni
– Time Magazine: Article by Ms. Moaveni
 
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More Book Reviews by David M. Kinchen
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— 11/15/04 BOOK REVIEW: Roth Envisions a Frightening 'What If?' in 'The Plot Against America'
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— 12/15/04 BOOK REVIEWS: 'Past Imperfect' Covers Complexities of History, Plagiarism Issues; 'His Excellency' Reveals George Washington's Accomplishments
— 12/29/04 BOOK REVIEWS: ‘de Kooning’ Chronicles Rise of American Art Supremacy; ‘Adams vs. Jefferson’ Shows That Controversial Presidential Elections are Nothing New
— 01/17/05 BOOK REVIEW: Max Hastings on Germany's 'Armageddon' as Allies from West, East Conquer Third Reich
— 01/24/05 BOOK REVIEW: ‘Images of America: Huntington’ Displays Glorious Architecture of West Virginia’s First Planned City
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— 01/31/05 BOOK REVIEWS: ‘Election 2004’ Shows How Bush Won; ‘Santa Cruz’ is Captivating Picture History of California’s Laid-Back Resort town
— 02/06/05 BOOK REVIEW: 'French Women Don't Get Fat' is a Delightful Way to Read Yourself Thin; Monsieurs: There's No Reason Why It Won't Work for You!
— 02/14/05 BOOK REVIEW: ‘Irish Milwaukee,’ ‘Italian Milwaukee’ Capture Flavor of One of America’s Best Cities — And Best Kept Secrets
— 02/17/05BOOK REVIEW: ‘Freedom Rising,’ Vividly Re-Creates Life in Nation's Capital During the Civil War
— 02/21/05 BOOK REVIEW: ‘ Are You Missing the Real Estate Boom?,’Economist Says There's No Danger of Housing Melt-Down; Says Media Exaggerates 'Bubble'
— 03/02/05 BOOK REVIEW: 'Freedom Rising' Vividly Re-Creates Life in Nation's Capital During the Civil War

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