A rich and soul-searching novel about an Iranian-American girl whose enigmatic father has decided to arrange her marriage

Jasmine Fahroodhi's Iranian father has always fascinated her. With his strange habits and shrouded past, she cannot fathom how he ended up marrying her prim American mother, although lately it seems that love in general is just as incomprehensible.

Failing out of school just shy of graduation after a disastrous romance sends her into a tailspin, a conflicted Jasmine returns home without any idea where her life is headed.

Her father has at least one idea: he has plans for a hastegar, an arranged marriage, between Jasmine and whatever man he sees fit. Confused, furious, yet intrigued, Jasmine meets suitor after suitor with increasingly disastrous, and humorous, results. Only when she begins to open herself up to the mysteries of familial and romantic love does Jasmine discover the truth about her evasive father—and the depths of her own strength—in Elizabeth Eslami's highly original and striking debut novel.