A Good Country: A Novel
(OverDrive MP3 Audiobook, OverDrive Listen)
A timely novel about the radicalization of a Muslim teen in California—about where identity truly lies, and how we find it
Laguna Beach, California, 2010. Alireza Courdee, a fourteen-year-old straight-A student and chemistry whiz, takes his first hit of pot. In as long as it takes to inhale and exhale, he is transformed from the high-achieving son of Iranian immigrants into a happy-go-lucky stoner. He loses his virginity, takes up surfing, and sneaks away to all-night raves. For the first time, Reza—now Rez—feels like an American teen. Life is smooth; even lying to his strict parents comes easily.
But then he changes again, falling out with the bad boy surfers and in with a group of kids more awake to the world around them, who share his background, and whose ideas fill him with a very different sense of purpose. Within a year, Reza and his girlfriend are making their way to Syria to be part of a Muslim nation rising from the ashes of the civil war.
Timely, nuanced, and emotionally forceful, A Good Country is a gorgeous meditation on modern life, religious radicalization, and a young man caught among vastly different worlds. What we are left with at the dramatic end is not an assessment of good or evil, east versus west, but a lingering question that applies to all modern souls: Do we decide how to live, or is our life decided for us?
If you are having problem transferring a title to your device, please fill out this support form or visit the library so we can help you to use our eBooks and eAudio Books.
Laleh Khadivi. (2017). A Good Country: A Novel. Unabridged Blackstone Publishing.
Chicago / Turabian - Author Date Citation (style guide)Laleh Khadivi. 2017. A Good Country: A Novel. Blackstone Publishing.
Chicago / Turabian - Humanities Citation (style guide)Laleh Khadivi, A Good Country: A Novel. Blackstone Publishing, 2017.
MLA Citation (style guide)Laleh Khadivi. A Good Country: A Novel. Unabridged Blackstone Publishing, 2017.
Library | Owned | Available |
---|---|---|
Shared Digital Collection | 1 | 1 |
OverDrive Product Record
- images
- cover:
- href: https://img1.od-cdn.com/ImageType-100/0887-1/{EB6A1E5F-C51C-43C1-B149-A9D2F96F8379}Img100.jpg
- type: image/jpeg
- thumbnail:
- href: https://img1.od-cdn.com/ImageType-200/0887-1/{EB6A1E5F-C51C-43C1-B149-A9D2F96F8379}Img200.jpg
- type: image/jpeg
- cover150Wide:
- href: https://img1.od-cdn.com/ImageType-150/0887-1/EB6/A1E/5F/{EB6A1E5F-C51C-43C1-B149-A9D2F96F8379}Img150.jpg
- type: image/jpeg
- cover300Wide:
- href: https://img1.od-cdn.com/ImageType-400/0887-1/EB6/A1E/5F/{EB6A1E5F-C51C-43C1-B149-A9D2F96F8379}Img400.jpg
- type: image/jpeg
- cover:
- formats
- identifiers:
- type: ISBN
- value: 9781470862138
- name: OverDrive MP3 Audiobook
- id: audiobook-mp3
- identifiers:
- identifiers:
- type: ISBN
- value: 9781470862138
- name: OverDrive Listen
- id: audiobook-overdrive
- identifiers:
- mediaType
- Audiobook
- primaryCreator
- role: Author
- name: Laleh Khadivi
- title
- A Good Country
- dateAdded
- 2017-10-13T14:46:00-04:00
- contentDetails
- href: https://link.overdrive.com/?websiteID=141&titleID=3046628
- type: text/html
- account:
- name: Sacramento Public Library (CA)
- id: 1151
- sortTitle
- Good Country A Novel
- crossRefId
- 3046628
- subtitle
- A Novel
- id
- eb6a1e5f-c51c-43c1-b149-a9d2f96f8379
- starRating
- 3.6
OverDrive MetaData
- isPublicDomain
- False
- formats
- duration: 08:58:24
- fileName: GoodCountryANovel-13122
- partCount: 8
- fileSize: 257029780
- identifiers:
- type: ISBN
- value: 9781470862138
- rights:
- type: PlayOnPC
- value: 1
- type: PlayOnPCCount
- value: -1
- type: BurnToCD
- value: 1
- type: BurnToCDCount
- value: -1
- type: PlayOnPM
- value: 1
- type: TransferToSDMI
- value: 1
- type: TransferToNonSDMI
- value: 1
- type: TransferCount
- value: -1
- type: CollaborativePlay
- value: 0
- type: PublicPerformance
- value: 0
- type: TranscodeToAAC
- value: 1
- name: OverDrive MP3 Audiobook
- isReadAlong: False
- id: audiobook-mp3
- onSaleDate: 6/10/2017
- samples:
- source: Part 1
- formatType: audiobook-mp3
- url: https://excerpts.cdn.overdrive.com/FormatType-425/0887-1/3046628-AGoodCountry.mp3
- source: From the book
- formatType: audiobook-overdrive
- url: https://samples.overdrive.com/?crid=eb6a1e5f-c51c-43c1-b149-a9d2f96f8379&.epub-sample.overdrive.com
- duration: 08:55:25
- fileName: GoodCountryANovel-13122
- partCount: 0
- fileSize: 257002054
- identifiers:
- type: ISBN
- value: 9781470862138
- name: OverDrive Listen
- isReadAlong: False
- id: audiobook-overdrive
- onSaleDate: 6/10/2017
- samples:
- source: Part 1
- formatType: audiobook-mp3
- url: https://excerpts.cdn.overdrive.com/FormatType-425/0887-1/3046628-AGoodCountry.mp3
- source: From the book
- formatType: audiobook-overdrive
- url: https://samples.overdrive.com/?crid=eb6a1e5f-c51c-43c1-b149-a9d2f96f8379&.epub-sample.overdrive.com
- creators
- role: Author
- fileAs: Khadivi, Laleh
- bioText:
Laleh Khadivi was born in Esfahan, Iran, in 1977. She received her MFA from Mills College and was a Creative Writing Fellow at Emory University. She is the author of The Age of Orphans, a Barnes & Noble Discover New Writers pick; and The Walking, among others. She has been awarded a Whiting Award, a Pushcart Prize, and an NEA Literature Fellowship. She has also worked as a director, producer, and cinematographer of documentary films. Khadivi lives in Northern California.
- name: Laleh Khadivi
- role: Narrator
- fileAs: Cohen, Assaf
- name: Assaf Cohen
- publishDate
- 2017-05-23T00:00:00-04:00
- edition
- Unabridged
- isOwnedByCollections
- True
- title
- A Good Country
- fullDescription
A timely novel about the radicalization of a Muslim teen in California—about where identity truly lies, and how we find it
Laguna Beach, California, 2010. Alireza Courdee, a fourteen-year-old straight-A student and chemistry whiz, takes his first hit of pot. In as long as it takes to inhale and exhale, he is transformed from the high-achieving son of Iranian immigrants into a happy-go-lucky stoner. He loses his virginity, takes up surfing, and sneaks away to all-night raves. For the first time, Reza—now Rez—feels like an American teen. Life is smooth; even lying to his strict parents comes easily.
But then he changes again, falling out with the bad boy surfers and in with a group of kids more awake to the world around them, who share his background, and whose ideas fill him with a very different sense of purpose. Within a year, Reza and his girlfriend are making their way to Syria to be part of a Muslim nation rising from the ashes of the civil war.
Timely, nuanced, and emotionally forceful, A Good Country is a gorgeous meditation on modern life, religious radicalization, and a young man caught among vastly different worlds. What we are left with at the dramatic end is not an assessment of good or evil, east versus west, but a lingering question that applies to all modern souls: Do we decide how to live, or is our life decided for us?
- reviews
- premium: True
- source:
- content:
March 27, 2017
Concluding a trilogy that began with 2009’s The Age of Orphans and continued with 2013’s The Walking, Khadivi’s stunning and timely portrait of the radicalization of a young Iranian-American man delicately examines the intersections between history, family, religion, and love, asking important questions about identity and our responsibility to the places we come from. Born and raised in southern California to immigrant parents, Rez Courdee is a typical American teenager: pushed to succeed at school and make his parents proud, he rebels with drugs and alcohol, partying, hooking up with girls, and spending long days in the sun on his surfboard. But he falls out with his group of friends after a disastrous surfing trip in Mexico and is welcomed instead into a circle of other children of immigrants who become targets of hate after a terror attack rocks the community. Encouraged by his new friends, Rez learns more about his ancestral heritage, Islam, and the ongoing war in Syria, slowly pulling away from who he was before and looking ahead into an unknown future. Khadivi masterfully succeeds in pulling off a deep and searching investigation into Rez’s journey from one world to another, following through on her relentlessly emotional vision all the way to its wrenching conclusion. This is a heartbreaking coming-of-age story about the world we live in now.
- popularity
- 197
- links
- self:
- href: https://api.overdrive.com/v1/collections/v1L1BWwAAAA2I/products/eb6a1e5f-c51c-43c1-b149-a9d2f96f8379/metadata
- type: application/vnd.overdrive.api+json
- self:
- id
- eb6a1e5f-c51c-43c1-b149-a9d2f96f8379
- starRating
- 3.7
- images
- cover:
- href: https://img1.od-cdn.com/ImageType-100/0887-1/{EB6A1E5F-C51C-43C1-B149-A9D2F96F8379}Img100.jpg
- type: image/jpeg
- thumbnail:
- href: https://img1.od-cdn.com/ImageType-200/0887-1/{EB6A1E5F-C51C-43C1-B149-A9D2F96F8379}Img200.jpg
- type: image/jpeg
- cover150Wide:
- href: https://img1.od-cdn.com/ImageType-150/0887-1/EB6/A1E/5F/{EB6A1E5F-C51C-43C1-B149-A9D2F96F8379}Img150.jpg
- type: image/jpeg
- cover300Wide:
- href: https://img1.od-cdn.com/ImageType-400/0887-1/EB6/A1E/5F/{EB6A1E5F-C51C-43C1-B149-A9D2F96F8379}Img400.jpg
- type: image/jpeg
- cover:
- isPublicPerformanceAllowed
- False
- languages
- code: en
- name: English
- subjects
- value: Fiction
- value: Literature
- publishDateText
- 05/23/2017
- otherFormatIdentifiers
- type: ISBN
- value: 9781470862084
- mediaType
- Audiobook
- shortDescription
Laguna Beach, California, 2009. Alireza Courdee, a fourteen-year-old straight-A student and chemistry whiz, takes his first hit of pot. In as long as it takes to inhale and exhale, he is transformed from the high-achieving son of Iranian immigrants into a happy-go-lucky stoner. He loses his virginity, takes up surfing, and sneaks away to all-night raves. For the first time, Reza—now Rez—feels like an American teen. Life is smooth; even lying to his strict father comes easily.
But then he changes again, falling out with the bad boy surfers and in with a group of kids more awake to the world around them, who share his background, and whose ideas fill him with a very different sense of purpose. Within a year, Reza and two friends are making their way to Syria to join in the fight.
Timely, nuanced, and emotionally forceful, A Good Country is a gorgeous meditation on modern life, religious radicalization, and a young man caught among vastly different...
- sortTitle
- Good Country A Novel
- crossRefId
- 3046628
- subtitle
- A Novel
- publisher
- Blackstone Publishing
- bisacCodes
- code: FIC019000
- description: Fiction / Literary
- code: FIC043000
- description: Fiction / Coming of Age