`Stories" is the subtitle of this first collection, but such is the length and attempted dramatic scope of most of the five tales that "novellas" might be more accurate. The five vary greatly in place and time: "The Country Road" tells of an eight-year-old's frustration with her still country home and her pale unresisting mother; the eponymous heroine of "Bronagh" is in temporary exile in Spain until her mother's illness brings her back to Portdoran, while the title story describes the arranged marriage of two political refugees from the Middle East in France.
Fittingly, Azadeh's skill at accurately appropriating the lives and habits of her multinational cast of characters is one of the main strengths of the collection. Whether in Morocco, Paris, rural Ireland or Spain, the characters are rarely other than wholly believable. At times, her narrative clarity and intent are a little unclear, when Azadeh's determination to make her characters exist only within the confines of her story overrides her function as a storyteller. Still, there are a number of powerful resonances and some fine writing in this thoughtful collection of assured short stories.