Call Her Freedom

November 11, 2024
In Dorabji’s stirring debut, a Himalayan family is torn apart by war. It begins in 1974, when eight-year-old Aisha’s father, Babek, leaves their village to join a guerrilla force, hoping to free their land, a thinly veiled Kashmir, from an unidentified colonial regime (the real Kashmir is partitioned into Chinese, Indian, and Pakistani territories). Aisha’s mother, Noorjahan, a midwife who teaches her daughter about healing herbs and tinctures, also runs a clandestine opium business, growing a huge field of poppies in a meadow near their home. She intends to use the proceeds for Aisha’s education. When Aisha is 17, Noorjahan dies from the flu, and Aisha is married off to her teacher’s son, Alim, upending her plan to study at a university. By the 1990s, Aisha is a devoted mother to their two children, but after Alim learns she’s been raped by soldiers, his impotent shame and her humiliation over what happened cause a rift between them. Aisha also weathers the return of Babek after a 20-year absence; following a long and torturous imprisonment, he’s a shell of who he once was. There’s little narrative momentum, and the murky geopolitical details tend to frustrate, but Dorabji thoroughly explores the theme of resilience as the story extends to 2022, when Aisha makes a tincture to help ward off a mysterious pandemic. Book clubs will enjoy this character-driven drama.