Come from the Shadows

Come from the Shadows is not about the Afghanistan we may think we know. It is not about the country depicted in urgent dispatches from embedded reporters; it isn't about the country evoked by anti-war protestors or the one that figures in heated political controversies over the treatment of prisoners. Instead, this is a book about the Afghanistan that lies "outside the wire," far from the Taliban's grim desert strongholds. The country we visit with award-winning author Terry Glavin is a surprisingly welcoming place, hidden away in alleys and narrow streets that bustle with blacksmiths, seamstresses, gem hawkers, cobblers and spice merchants. This Afghanistan is reawakening from decades of savagery and bloodletting, and its people are deeply thankful for the aid from foreign soldiers. In the voices of the people he meets on his journey, Glavin reveals how events have unfolded in Afghanistan since September 11, 2001. In the life story of his friend and travel companion—writer, translator and activist Abdulrahim Parwani — we learn of Afghanistan's agonies over the past thirty years. Come from the Shadows is a passionate challenge to the usual depiction of the war in Afghanistan.