Armenian Books

I bought this book about thirty years ago when I first began to cook and I have been a fan ever since. The author has the gift of being able to put together a recipe in a simple, easy to follow, readable way. Over the years I have cooked the majority of recipes in this book and even ordinary sounding ones like baked chicken with tomatoes are exquisite. The recipe for baklava which calls for a longer cooking time than any other I've ever seen is the only one ever use and the most delicious I've ever eaten.An intriguing and delicious dessert is apricots with whipped cream, an invention of the author. Ms. Uvezian's touch turns every recipe, even the most basic, into a real treat.this is not a book I would ever part with.

without compromising flavor. Armenian food is is full of history and meaning and reflects the foods native to their land.
This book is written by an Armenian woman who knows her food! Her recipes are easy to understand and there are suggestions for side dishes as well. Reading this cookbook is reading the love of the authors' heritage and the respect she has for this great world cuisine. Everything I have made from this book has made my Armenian husband rejoice.

I have used various editions of this classic cookbook over the years, and it remains one of my all-time favorites. Unlike the 1998 edition, which fell apart after only a couple of weeks, this new one is much better made and is holding up very well. Also, the quality of the illustrations is far superior.

Uvezian has done an admirable job of presenting hundreds of mouthwatering and healthful recipes in her characteristically clear and concise style. The dishes described are rich and varied, the simple-to-follow instructions explain exactly what to do, and the ingredients called for are easy to find. The recipes from the Caucasus, which were unknown in America before the original hardcover edition of this book came out, are in themselves worth the purchase price.

"The Cuisine of Armenia" is a real treasure. Not only is it a must have for every Armenian household, it belongs in the library of every enthusiastic cook.

The Cuisine of Armenia is a great book. I bought this book for my sister and she realy liked it. The book reveles that some foods that Turks and Arabs say comes from them is realy Armenian. Sicne Armenians lived under Turkish and Arabs rule for a long time some of our food were taken from us and became "Trukish". It has all the recipes of all Armenian foods. If the book had pictures it wil have been easier to understand how to make the foods. A great book for all those who want to make great tasting Armenian cuisines.

This is a very fine cookbook that provides a large number of mouth-watering recipes written in a clear and straightforward style. Dishes from both Eastern and Western Armenia are included, as are a number of Uvezian's own creations that are steeped in the Armenian tradition. Although the book lacks color photos, it does have a stunning color shot of Ararat Pilaf (two peaks of rice shaped like Great and Little Ararat) on the cover and includes beautiful drawings of dishes that are placed at the beginning of each chapter. I especially like the two illustrations that make striking use of old Armenian churches as a backdrop as well as the elegant medieval Armenian manuscript illumination that borders both the title page and the table of contents. Since this volume is moderately priced (and a great value considering the treasure that lies within it), expecting it to contain color photos would be unrealistic; the cost would have been prohibitive. Actually, the directions are so easy to follow that pictures are unnecessary. I would much rather have a cookbook like this that offers an extensive selection of outstanding recipes in addition to a tremendous amount of helpful and necessary culinary information, plus some lovely illustrations. Although Uvezian has provided a generous amount of enlightening historical material that traces the roots of Armenian cuisine far back into antiquity, she has wisely avoided trying to pinpoint the origins of the dishes, a task impossible to accomplish due to the long tradition of cultural and culinary interchange in the Middle East and Caucasus. As she explains, in addition to preserving their repertoire of national dishes, Armenians have skillfully assimilated foods of other peoples in the region and, conversely, a number of Armenian recipes have become part of the cuisines of other cultures. Until a time machine is invented that allows us to go back into the past without being impaled on someone's sword, it is probably best for us not to argue about origins but to celebrate the extraordinary creativity and diversity of Armenian cuisine as presented to us in this exceptional cookbook and to savor the delectable results it produces with joy and gratitude.

I've re-read this book several times because the first time wasn't enough; Mark Arax's ability to weave the details of his exhaustive research throughout this personal story provides fresh insight into society's sanctioned racism, a not-so-bygone era of California's heartland and every fatherless young man's struggle to find his identity. The characters and history are brought to life with such rich and poignant storytelling skill you won't be able to put it down, whether you're reading it for the first time or know how it ends.

This is a wonderful book about the Armenian community in Fresno, a search by an adult newspaperman into the circumstances of his father's unsolved murder, and policital corruption in the 70's. Mark Arax also co-authored a biography of a politically powerful large scale cotton farmer named Boswell located near Hanford, where I grew up. Highly recommended.
BerkeleyBob

I'm originally from Fresno, California and at the time of this murder, my grandfather, Ted C. Wills Sr., was Mayor of the city. When I picked up this book, I didn't know what to expect. What I found was validation.

For years I struggled with the bits and pieces of recollection I had regarding this period of my youth. Arax's book not only validated my experiences, what I had witnessed, but connected many of the dots regarding other incidences related to my past. The cover ups, illegal activity and silent handshakes were a part of my youth and Arax described this perfectly.

The author's well placed words painted one vivid picture after another about a mystery which is reality based. At the end of the book, the pictures come together as one complete "town" portrait. In doing this, he brilliantly exposed the "dark side" of not only my history, but of a town bent on keeping up appearances, at all costs. Secrets were taken out of the closet and placed squarely on to the laps of the public at large. "If we do not expose our secrets, we are bound to repeat them."

I strongly suggest this book to anyone interested in seeing how organized crime on a local level works. Along with this, I hope that readers will appreciate how the author was able to weave powerful Armenian history with not only his own family of origin, but with the political and criminal drama of a small town.

Mark Arax has written a superb novel chronicling his zealous search for the
identity of the men who gunned down his father in his own bar in Fresno
back in 1972 when Mark was 15. The gripping story takes us from Fresno to LA
to NY to Mexico and Anatolia, the Ottoman empire, 1915, San Francisco, and
back to Fresno to circle around the little city of corruption and crime,
related to the pernicious drug trade. Armenia, a nation of people erased
from its ancestral homeland, submitted to genocide by the Turks
and dispersed in this American century, to America which promised freedom
and opportunity, delivered new strife, leading to new crises.

This epic saga tells of three generations of Arax family members overcoming
impossible odds to finally make a decent home for themselves in Fresno only
to have it shattered by a cold blooded murder on a Sunday evening in a
shady bar just before Mark's dad was to have made a public announcement,
naming names, letting the public know what went on in city hall and at
police headquarters. He was executed Mafia style with a son left in its
wake holding on to a bag of questions and a burning desire to get some
answers.

And yet, this state is endemic to the Armenian existence in its diaspora.
The resonances between Mark Arax's saga and that of every post-genocide
Armenian are loud and clear. Why were over a million of their forefathers
so brutally and systematically slaughtered like cattle at the turn of this
century? Why was the life of every Armenian in the Ottoman empire so cheap
and worthless? What had Armenians done to deserve the racist wrath of
Turks, Kurds and other nomadic bands of brigands in the Anatolian plains,
the ancestral homeland of all Armenians? Why do Turks today not admit what
is so plainly true? Why the denial and historical revisionism? How are
dignity and justice to be restored when nations place economic or strategic
considerations before the demands of historical truths? How can
democracies and free nations join in the Turkish lie that nothing happened
in 1915, it was just war, things like that happen all the time, let bygones
be bygones...?

Mark Arax would not stop asking his haunting questions either. His father
was murdered. The police never even tried to solve the case. Mark would
do his damnedest to get to the bottom of it himself, and he would do it at
any cost. Mark Arax was rewarded for his quixotic aspirations by much more
than he could have imagined. While the minutest details of his father's
murder are still unresolved, what Mark discovered was more precious and
more lasting than the particulars of a case of a Fresno drug mob and city
hall -- about to be exposed -- hit. Mark Arax found the true identity of
his people, the Armenians in the Californian diaspora, and their struggle
to preserve their traditions and rich heritage. Through all this, Mark
fathered himself to become a gifted professional journalist, a responsible
father and husband and a conscientious citizen. The long and persistent
journey that he took makes for a great read. The story is compelling and
gripping, yet it is filled with true human drama spanning three
generations. His is not a murder mystery with bought off politicians all
the way to Sacramento, with its rich source of drugs supplied from Mexico.
No, that is only part of the story. His is not the chronicling of how the
Hell's Angels distributed marijuana to all points north and south in the
60s and 70s, with the marijuana being air-dropped into the vineyards of
Fresno. No, that is only part of the story. His is not the story of a
"crazy" grandfather who was a businessman who held fond attachment to
communist ideology, who had big dreams and bombastic demeanor and yet
failed as many times as not in all his business ventures. His uncles,
great uncles and his own struggle with American or Armenian identity all
mix in to produce a unique story of love and redemption. A boy who has to
be the rudder in a cracked up society, a disintegrating yet ever expanding
town and a broken home. What Mark Arax achieves with his own life is a
courageous feat. To defeat the forces of decadence that took his father
away by rejecting that underworld and that easy life. To enter the ranks
of the successful the hard way, by dedication, talent, sweat and toil.

Ironically, Mark might very well have ended up a two bit hood himself and a
cheap hustler hanging around his dad's bar or the golf club, dealing,
racketeering and begging for trouble. Instead, his father's loss jolted
him into a state of permanent revulsion at that seedy world he was just
beginning to get comfortable in at the age of 15. By correctly identifying
it as the prime seducer who claimed his father, Mark avoided that scene and
kept it away from his family. Instead, by finding his deepest roots he has
been able to set some of his own. Let us hope that his tree flourishes
under that hot central California sun and that his children know their dad
for the American hero on the pages of "In My Father's Name," that he surely
is. Read for yourself and see!

When I first started this book, I was amazed at the description that Arax gives of Fresno. Being a life-long resident of Fresno, I can imagine everything he describes. Then I read about the corruption that I'd heard about all my life, and see the proof of it all. I was shocked beyond belief.

Then I read about these supposedly upstanding citizens that I've heard about all my life (who has community centers and arena's named after them here in Fresno) and I feel like a veil has been pulled from my eyes.

Mark Arax tells a story of life in a lot of small, and large, cities. The one part of the story I wish would have been included (but it is safer for him NOT to include, being that he is still a resident of Fresno) is not only the corruption of the past, but the corruption of the present as well. He describes how the city of Fresno was built upon corruption, ran in corruption for many years, and hinted to the present day corruption, but had to stop. Hopefully he will write another book about Fresno, and reveal something to everyone.

If you like to read, and you like to be trapped by a book, then I suggest you purchase this book.

In The Immigrant's Daughter, Mary Terzian has crafted a page turning account of her experience growing up in Cairo in a family that considers losing their ties to the Armenian "Motherland" a betrayal of their forefathers' massacre. Vividly told, with amazing recall, Terzian makes a peaceful, pre-war era come alive, from the sights and smells of the marketplace, right down to the buttons on her school uniform. You feel her anguish at the loss of her mother at a young age, her fear during World War II air raids, and the pressure to excel as a student while enduring the scorn of her father over wasting money on a girl's education. Sheer determination, grit and resolve are underlaid with aching vulnerability and leavened with humor. Once you pick this book up, you won't want to put it down.

This award winning book, "The Immigrant's Daughter," by Mary Terzian, is a literary achievement in more than one dimension. Her personal experience of growing up in Cairo, Egypt, in a family that was deported from its ancestral Armenian homeland, is most captivating and heartwarming. The emotional stress and psychological turbulences, caused by constrictive family traditions, in a young girl who is striving for respect and identity, are presented with eloquence draped in simplicity. Mary's style and language, often seasoned with subtle humor, are the manifestations of her professionalism and creativity.

The impact of "The Immigrant's Daughter" goes beyond the Armenian-Egyptian bi-cultural environment. The ongoing industrial and economic globalization is creating multicultural societies across the continents. Millions from third world countries or rural areas are moving to more industrialized cities or countries. Consequently the adaptation of old traditions and cultures with prevailing conditions creates internal strife in families. Inevitably children are caught between these conflict-filled circumstances, facing individual challenges. These children and subsequent generations could certainly benefit from Mary Terzian's real-life experiences by reading the loud message in her book: uncompromising pursuit of education, motivation, perseverance, and adaptation of traditional moral values in a new milieu.

Growing up in your own country is difficult enough, but as an immigrant always in transit has to be a burden most of us will never have to bear. Mary's journey is a triumph over culture and family tradition. In Cairo when King Farouk and Queen Farida have a daughter the celebration is subdued. A boy would have brought jubilation and five pounds to every family - the girl produces two. Mary talks to her mother and figures it out. Girls are worth less, but that doesn't break Mary's spirit. She's bright and intelligent enough to see through the double standard. And in her school, work and travels she manages to stays ahead of the game with a genteel wit and disarming humor that always rubs the right way.

Tom Barnes author of "Doc Holliday's Road to Tombstone."
"The Hurricane Hunters and Lost in the Bermuda Triangle."
"The Goring Collection."

The Hurricane Hunters And Lost in the Bermuda Triangle
Doc Holliday's Road to Tombstone: The Life and Times of John Henry Holliday
The Goring Collection

Growing up in your own country is difficult enough, but as an immigrant always in transit has to be a burden most of us will never have to bear. Mary's journey is a triumph over culture and family tradition. In Cairo when King Farouk and Queen Farida have a daughter the celebration is subdued. A boy would have brought jubilation and five pounds to every family - the girl produces two. Mary talks to her mother and figures it out. Girls are worth less, but that doesn't break Mary's spirit. She's bright and intelligent enough to see through the double standard. And in her school, work and travels she manages to stays ahead of the game with a genteel wit and disarming humor that always rubs the right way.

Tom Barnes Author "Doc Holliday's Road to Tombatone."

"Where do you come from?" is the first question of Mary Terzian's absorbing memoir of her journey from her native land of Egypt to the United States. The Immigrants' Daughter is a story about personal identity: of shifting cultural contexts within which a young woman must find, and finally create, herself.

Born to Armenian parents who survived Turkish genocide to settle in Egypt, Mary spends her childhood and teen years in Cairo. Her memories of those pre-war days are sharp and clear, rich in the distinctive sights and sounds and smells of bustling, cosmopolitan Cairo, with its crowded streets, colorful markets, and multi-ethnic crowds. The loss of her mother and her father's remarriage create enormous change for her, personal losses and challenges interwoven with the German invasion of Egypt. "Between Mama's death, World War II, and the insecurities of life, childhood slips away unnoticed," she writes, as she struggles to imagine something other than the conventional fates of wife and mother (or seamstress: her father's idea of an acceptable occupation) for which her traditional culture destines her.

At last, after some conniving (the scene in which Mary translates and attempts to mediate the fiery argument between her father and the school's administrator is priceless), Mary manages to enter the academic track in her secondary school. She embarks on her first job, in the office of a trading company, and finally achieves a measure of independence: she leaves her restrictive, demanding father and stepmother and takes a room at the Y.W.C.A. In the last few chapters of the memoir, a new job with the United Nations takes her out into the world beyond her cultural borders.

Mary's account of her struggles with her strictly traditional father reminded of my own, and made me think that perhaps all fathers of our era were alike, whatever their nationality. And all daughters, too, perhaps, for Mary's story reminded me of my own desperate desire to escape from my parents' life and into a life of my own.

Perhaps we can all echo Mary's credo: "Where do I come from? I come from the core of humanity, from a combination of joys and sorrows, from circumstances that fashion destiny, from experiences that forge character, from the sum total of expressed or repressed emotions that I have entertained during my life."

Mary Terzian's compelling memoir is told in the present tense, which gives it vigor and urgency. The book is a good read, a thoughtful presentation of a difficult life's passage, and a richly-colored portrait of Armenian immigrant life in pre- and post-war Egypt.

by Susan Wittig Albert
for Story Circle Book Reviews
www.storycirclebookreviews.org
reviewing books by, for, and about women

Monte Melkonian was a great man, and his cause was noble. The turkish government occupies historically Armenian lands, and lies about the brutal killings of the Armenian Genocide, even to this day. The lies of the turkish government are clearly demonstrated by the last reviewer. There are 10s of thousands of documents in the U.S. alone, first hand accounts from foreign diplomats in Armenia at the time, that prove the validity of the claim of Armenian genocide. But thats not how the story gets passed along. I have never met an Armenian in the Armenian diaspora that doesn't have some gruesome story of their family in the Armenian Genocide. In my family, the men were shot, the women raped and sent on deathmarches, and the only survivors were two teenagers, orphaned, and sent to America. This is where Monte Melkonian gets his inspiration. He knows that Armenians in the Armenian diaspora were forced out by the turks, and that they will return to their ancestral homeland of over 2000 years once it is ridden of the turkish occupiers.

About the claim that the last reviewer brought up about fighting on the part of the Armenians during the time of the Armenian Genocide, take this quote from The German Vice-Consulate at Erzerum: "Ittihad will dangle before the eyes of the allies the specter of an alleged revolution prepared by the Armenian Dashnak party. Moreover local incidents of social unrest and acts of Armenian self-defense will deliberately be provoked and inflated and will be used as pretexts to effect the deportations. Once en route however, the convoys will be attacked and exterminated by Kurdish and Turkish brigands, and in part by gendarmes, who will be instigated for that purpose by Ittihad." This qoute obviously proves that from the beginning, the turkish government planned on lying about the Armenian genocide in the very mannor that the last reviewer lied about it.

The review the previous person posted here, he posted 10 times, so it should not even be considered a review of a book, and should be taken off the site. I would not be surprised if the person who left this extremely offensive and insulting review turned out to be working for the turkish government, or is at least "brainwashed" by the U.S. funds spent by the turkish government to deny the Genocide (yes, thats right, U.S. FUNDS!) I know that the Armenian Genocide occured, and that the turks were the perpetrators, because not only have I read the countless first hand accounts of foreigners, but I have listend to people who actually escaped the Genocide. Until the turkish government admits to the Armenian Genocide, and gives us our land back, they will be just as guilty as those who carried out the Genocide, because by not admitting to it, they are condoning it.

Mitchell is a Turk or quasi turk who is out there to deny Armenian Genocide by denigrating Armenian efforts of recognition and quoting various so called researchers like Shaw, McCarthy, Lowry and others like Weems, Lewy, all of whom are working for the turkish government.
The book was well written, and gramatically correct. It shows that the first genocide of the 20th century is still victimizing generations of Armenians. Genocide continues when personalities like Mitchell denies it occurence. Armenian Genocide is well accepted fact by at least 126 Israeli scholars and others around the world.

This review is addressed about the book not only to everyone who reads, but in specific to a man who wrote a review previously on the book. It was long-winded and grammatically aweful to say the least, so I hope for this to be short and well-written. Mr. Mitchell, if you believe that the genocide of the Armenian people in Turkey was "propoganda," then go write a positive review on a book confirming your point. You claimed to hold no position on the matter, but your writing clearly proved otherwise.

As for the book, what I read of it I found superb. Let everyone who reads this know that this book is worth reading. Not only is it well-written, but documentation is good as well.

Although I had read his biography right before reading this book (which I recommend, especially since this book is just a collection of his writings), I felt a strong sense of purpose in his mission in life.
Though somewhat fogged by cold-war propaganda, especially since the U.S. won, Montes constant focus for the Armenian cause is clear, despite the cold-war rhetoric which might confuse some people. There was a line drawn in the sand during the cold war; some were on the side of capitalism, and some were on the side of progresive socialism.
Though a critic could easily attack Monte for being a 'communist', the bottom line is that whatever he was, he was for the hope and future of the Armenian people. His loyalty to the former Soviet Republic of Armenia was based on the fact (which he constantly repeats) that most Armenians lived in the USSR, and that Kemalist Turkey was on the other side of 'the line'. He shatters paradigms with sharp truths and his passion for a true Armenia, for Armenians, with a honorable future is clearly his focus. His respectful criticisms of the current and past issues of the community are a great lesson for us today, if we ever want to better our resolve.

this book is amazing to anyone who wants to understand how armenians still have emotional scars and feelings of revenge when concerning the armenian genocide.
monte was a true patriot, a tashnag, who served his people with his life.

This is foremost a touching love story nurtured within a fast paced and enthralling adventure story, drawn around very engaging and recognizable characters. It is complemented by an insider's knowledge of what it is to live and work within the Foreign Service. Set principally in Armenia, it packs a well-defined and eminently readable rendering of the country and its population, together with the scars and strengths arisen from its history and religion. As a bonus, when covering the activities of certain of its characters, the author provides erudite and detailed descriptions, as for example in dealing with numismatics and with airplane flying techniques. All in all, this is a book hard to put down once begun.

This is the first book I've actually taken the time to read since the birth of my second child. Why? Well, I've picked up others, but in trying to find time in my hectic schedule, they just didn't seem worth the effort. The Courier, however, grabbed me from the get-go, and I felt I *had* to make time to find out what happened to the characters. I enjoyed immensely the intrigue and adventure of the book, and learned a great deal about Armenia at the same time. Great read. I'm looking forward to James Christian's next book.

This is foremost a touching love story nurtured within a fast paced and enthralling adventure story, drawn around very engaging and recognizable characters. It is complemented by an insider's knowledge of what it is to live and work within the Foreign Service. Set principally in Armenia, it packs a well-defined and eminently readable rendering of the country and its population, together with the scars and strengths arisen from its history and religion. As a bonus, when covering the activities of certain of its characters, the author provides erudite and detailed descriptions, as for example in dealing with numismatics and with airplane flying techniques. All in all, this is a book hard to put down once begun.

This is a splendid story, well constructed and well paced. There is lots of interesting information about Armenia. The action is believable. The ending is savvy. It's not all stage settings as is so often the case with adventure novels. Great fun reading! Congratulations to this new author!

The Courier is an adventure story and a love story whose characters are well-developed and whose people, places, scents and sights are woven together to create a vivid picture of Armenia as it was in 1995. The author obviously liked Armenia and its people and he honors us with this novel.

The touches of local color--Yerevan's ancient streets, the vernesazsh, the Geghard wedding dance, the vistas from Garni Fortress and Lake Sevan--make this book particularly meaningful to Armenians and to anyone who's been to Armenia. And I loved the images the story conjured up of other places featured in the book--Diyarbekir, Mardin, Aleppo and Damascus.

But this book is first and foremost an adventure story that builds and builds, picking up pace until it becomes impossible to put down because the resolutions remain in doubt to the very end. I heartily recommend this book to anyone who loves exciting fiction and especially to Armenians who want to connect with their ancestral homeland as it was immediately after independence.

I had to hold back tears for most of what I read in this book. This is a great book that reveals once again what the Turks did to the Armenians. If you have read any other Armenian Geoncide related books by other authors, you will notice the smiliarity of the stories. They experiences of people who were part of the inhumane acts by the Turks are very much alike. Ms. Mouradian has done a great job describing her family's experience during one of the most difficult times in the 20th century. This is a must read if you want to either learn about the Genocide or know more about it.

A GIFT IN THE SUNLIGHT

By Kay Mouradian

Review by James Ajemian, Ph.D.

In recent years Armenian political organizations in the United States have brought increasing pressure to bear on Congress and the president to formally acknowledge the 1915-16 Turkish genocide against the Armenians. This has produced a politically financed assault by the Turkish government to deny such an event ever occurred despite potent historical documentation to the contrary. In addition an increasing number of countries around the world have declared their recognition of the first genocide of the twentieth century. Yet the U.S. hesitates to do so for fear of alienating its ally Turkey, in order to gain political, economic and military advantages in the Middle East. Nevertheless the drive to achieve American recognition continues to grow. It has won adherents from government representatives at all levels, including a number of U.S. cities that have officially recognized the Armenian Genocide.
In the midst of all of this activity, Kay Mouradian, a retired professor of health and physical education, has written a novel based in part on her mother Flora's experience of living through and surviving the genocide. Mouradian says, "This is more than just Flora's story. It is also the story of every Armenian who survived that tragic historical event that continues to be glossed over by the modern world."
In addition to preserving family memories Mouradian did extensive research for this book. A Gift in the Sunlight tells the story of a teenage Armenian girl from Hadjin and her family, her parents, grandmother, and five siblings, who, along with all the Armenians from her village, were forced by order of the Turkish government into a death march to Syria to the south. As we know, this was repeated throughout Turkey, leading to the near extinction of a cultural, religious, and civil society that had existed for more than two thousand years.
With Flora as the central character, we travel along the march with this family. Flora and her older sister, Verkin, face dangerous encounters with Turkish soldiers. Everyone suffers from the lack of food, water and sustenance in general. Exposure to the elements brings illness and death to thousands.
When Flora reaches Syria she is separated from her family and faces vividly described trying events. We see a desperate attempt for an end to her misery. We experience her anguish over her own family and we see her in encounters with strangers also entangled in confusion and chaos. Flora has had her world, her hopes, ambitions and plans crushed right before her eyes. She had attended school in Constantinople and, under the guidance of an American Missionary instructor, had hoped to pursue higher education in America.
Because so much has been written about the Armenian Genocide I questioned whether a description of that horrific, monstrous disaster could be successfully narrated in a novel. Yet Mouradian's book left me feeling uplifted and with my soul comforted. What is particularly intriguing is her skill in conveying all of the emotions of a family split apart by death, by separations, and by reunion too. The tragic story of Flora and her family stands for that of thousands of other families that suffered a similar fate, or worse, in those ill-begotten times.
By beginning with family history Mouradian has accomplished a feat that I doubted would be possible. The momentum of A Gift in the Sunlight is like that of a dramatic, vivid documentary rather than a novel; yet, like a novel, it keeps the reader spellbound right up to the conclusion. The postscript, a description of Mouradian's mother's last years, adds to the profound quality of her writing.
The response from non-Armenian readers will differ from that of Armenians, who are fully cognizant of those terrible times. They are in one way or another connected to long-ago events that have very few still-living witnesses. I can imagine the impact this book will have on Armenians who are descendants of those who were lost or those who survived but suffered from post-traumatic stress syndrome. Each of us could tell a story about our parents or grandparents. My own mother, too, suffered severely and never fully recovered from her trauma. By presenting her tale, Mouradian gives comfort to and does justice to all Armenians.
Non-Armenian readers will be enlightened by the connection between the Armenian Genocide and the genocides that have followed. I urge everyone to read this book, and to be prepared for the ending as well as the postscript that follows.

Dr. Ajemian is Professor Emeritus of Social Work at San Diego State University

This story of a young Armenian girl's life during the Turkish genocide of the Armenians, is an amazing story of survival and strength. Filor and her family were victims of the death marches, ethnic cleansing, racism and prejudice during the early 1900's. Many of her family members were killed, died or were separated. This story focuses on young Filor, the author's mother, as she faces death, heartbreak and destruction to her life and family.


This story is especially important for younger readers to understand atrocities such as these happened in "modern times", and how racism and hate can only hurt and destroy lives.

A powerful story poignantly told.
Kay Mouradian proves that that humans best grasp the horror of tragedy or atrocity not so much through knowing the large numbers of unidentified victims, but rather through the experiences of one person, one family.
This story of Mouradian's mother--the story of thousands of Armenians--is written in a gentle but unflinching way. Through its very restraint, "A Gift in the Sunlight" punctuates both the suffering and resiliance of one woman and, indeed, an entire community of people.

This book was a real eye opener for myself, my wife Maureen and many of our friends. None of us knew very much about the Armenian Genocide that happened nearly 100 years ago. Kay Mouradian writes of the perils, dangers and tragedies of the genocide as told by a young daughter who with her family and thousands of others were tragically herded away from their homes.

Hundreds of thousands of Armenians were killed or died in the brutal genocide. It became easy to see how the entire Armenian country/population/people were nearly eliminated from the earth. Armenian scholars, leaders and families were systematically destroyed.

This story, centered on young Flora and her family, is told in an accurate and fair manner. Amidst the horrors of being persecuted, betrayed and herded away from homes and into the desert, there was bravery, unlikely heroes and extreme faith. Kay writes that there were even rare instances of humanity and care given by the Turks, the persecutors.

The protaganist of this story is a young girl whose entire extended family is suddenly told to pack up and join all of the other Armenians being forced to leave all possessions, properties and friends. Toward the end of the book, Kay Mouradian tells us the real person Flora was modeled after and shares with us that real person's poignant story through the rest of her long life.

This book is factually based, heavily researched and a MUST read for everyone. Readers will gain an appreciation of this little known, yet immense, example of hatred and evil. At the same time, readers will also get immediately involved in the strengths and values of those being persecuted as they struggled to survive.

Finally, when you find out just how personal and remarkable this story had become to Kay Mouradian. She had to share the tale with others and upon finishing the book one will see what an immense sense of peace and satisfaction Kay must have had upon its publication.

My wife, our friends and I recommend this book to all.

A novel that tells the story of an Armenian Family during the Armenian Genocide of 1915. The story is very well written and immediately captivates its audience. Once you get into it, you won't be able to put it down. It becomes part of you. Once you finish reading it, it will stay with you forever.

The Definitive Historical Novel
A Summer Without Dawn is the best and definitive historical novel ever written on the Armenian Genocide during the First World War. Its spirited, vibrant writing, frequent twists and happenings, abundance of events and unusual love stories, ``secrets of the heart`` keep the reader`s interest at the boiling point till the last page. A fabulous read for lovers of good literature and history--one is educated while being entertained. It is bound to become a great classic in its genre. . .

A Summer Without Dawn is a credit to the historical genre. The authors have created a great beautiful story, providing the reader with long hours of intermingled pleasure and anxiety. This work is quite without parallel in its richness of detail, despite the fact that its action unfolds during the First World War. The storytelling genius of the authors and the romantic plot that is developed with such superb skill forbids the reader to put the novel down until the last page.

This new and sweeping epic about the Armenian Genocide of the First World War will surely start a trend. The authors have managed to fashion something of compelling beauty and importance

This saga of 20th century`s first ethnic slaughter is written by the heart and guts. It by far supersedes Werfel`s Forty Days of Musa Dagh which has been elevated almost to a reputed scripture about the Armenian`s unyielding spirit. An epic diligently faithful to history. This extraordinary novel gets under the reader`s skin and seizes your imagination until you finish reading the last word. Extraordinarily cinematic, brimmingly eventful, exotique, replete with suspense and fabulous descriptions with a flowing literary narrative. No wonder the novel became an instant best-seller when it first appeared. It is bound to become a classic of its genre and hopefully a great movie soon.

This is a well written book and covers a very deep and important topic. Thomas Ohanian sets up the stage first, letting us get to know the characters and feel for them and their way of life. Then he gives us grim hints of what is coming, chills us with hopelessness of the onslaught, and then smashes their world before us and lets us watch it struggle and die.

I know people who deny that the Armenian Genocide happened and who say hateful things about the Armenians. They remind me of those in this story who despised the Armenians, and who took part in their death. I wish those people I know would read this book.

Mr. Ohanian's story educates and informs while putting the reader on a roller coaster of emotions. I enjoyed the descriptive insight into life of the Armenian people, their culture, customs and emphasis on family and religious faith. The depiction of the attrocities and apathy of the majority raises questions of morality and responsibility that continue to reverberate in the World today. I highly recommend this well documented, emotional story of a time in history that should never be forgotten!

The book is devastating. What it does that's unusual is tell its story at both the largest scale and the smallest, with both global context and heartbreaking detail. Initially I was wary of the technique, thinking that it would be better to just tell the villagers' story, but I was quickly won over; the other sections provided the answer to why, without which Hagop's and Sona's story would be less powerful. What it manages to do particularly well is to present such heartbreaking incidents in a voice that avoids all mawkishness and overt sentimentimentality, yet doesn't seem at all cold or dispassionate. I think a lot of this felt emotion is supplied by the reader, motivated by the sympathy we feel for the
charachters, who are so well-drawn that our identification with them comes naturally. This is a book that will stay with you for a long time.

Lines in the Sand, by Thomas Ohanian, is a brilliant story of love, courage, abd triumph over death and desruction in the wake of the Armenian genocide 1915-1917. The story fluctuates between historical events that led to the destuction of a peaceful people in small Armenian towns in what is now present day Turkey. Besides historical perspectives, this book tells of the fictional story of two Armenian families, one from the town of Palou, Turkey, and the other from the town of Bitlis. Hagop, the young Armenian man had fallen in love with Sova, a beautiful young Armenian girl, and they were bethrothed to marry each other in a years time. The story of their young lives, family, and traditions are beautifully portrayed in this unique story. The customs, beliefs, and traditions of the Armenian people are explained with beautiful description concerning the Christian rituals and religious holidays and feasts. In addition to different types of Armenian foods and deserts, the book captures the strong binding family ties that even today's Armenians continue to display. In conclusion, the book is phenomenal and captivating; it is one of the best done on this subject.

For two days I was absorbed in this wonderful, terrible odyssey. Wonderful because of the love, tradition, pride, and strength shown by the characters as their lives unfolded and the reader was masterfully assimilated into their families. Then, terrible as the reader was thrust into the blinding reality of unspeakable horrors that annihilated this gentle, proud race of fellow human beings. May God in His wisdom prevent this tragedy from ever happening again...and, when will people EVER learn???

Vartan Gregorian has written a thoroughly fascinating book about his remarkable life and accomplishments. In this day and age a great deal of attention is paid to the "common man", as it well should be. But we tend to overlook the fact that it is the uncommon man that leads the way to advances in our culture. Vartan Gregorian is an compelling example of the remarkable talent nature only rarely incorporates into a human body, enabling startling results to be achieved.

From an unremarkable -- indeed, unpromising -- beginning, the child Vartan depended not on his family but on his grandmother and interested strangers to encourage his budding talents. His Armenian ancestors had fled to Iran from persecution and death in Turkey. His mother died when he was a young boy and his father and his stepmother were not close to him. But through a variety of fortuitous interventions he found his way from Iran to Stanford, where he earned his first academic degree.

At Stanford he married a remarkable woman who evidently shared his ability to adjust to new and challenging conditions. She had her first baby in Iran as Gregorian traveled in Afghanistan on a research grant. Then Gregorian began a dizzying ascent of academic activity that took him first to San Francisco State College, then to the University of Texas, and ultimately to the University of Pennsylvania where he became provost. His descriptions of academic politics -- the confoundedly complex interactions of presidents, deans, chancellors, and trustees -- are as fascinating as they are gut-twisting.

It was Gregorian's next move that put him on the public radar. He reluctantly became the head of New York City's Public Library. It was a decaying empire, having reached its peak in earlier decades but now floundering with insufficient scholastic vision and financial support. Gregorian proved to be just the man with the unusual abilities to turn things gloriously around. His vast scholarly knowledge, his enthusiasm and energy, his sense of humor, and his charisma brought in tens of millions of dollars from wealthy donors who were grateful that they had a cause to believe in, as well as a man in whom they could put their trust to use their money in a constructive way.

Gregorian's accomplishments continued unabated as he then moved into the presidency of Brown University, ultimately becoming the head of the Carnegie Foundation.

Here is a man of energy ("I was born energetic"), of vision, of knowledge, of acumen, of character, of superlative accomplishment. Here is a man to admire, to be inspired by. Here is the uncommon man who boosts culture upward.

Although Dr. Gregorian was a poor Armenian boy from Tabriz, Iran, he had a rich cultural heritage. Influential hometown people, who seemed captivated by his charm and intellectual brilliance, helped him, not only just to survive, but to get a good education, leading him, by way of Beirut, to the U.S. and Stanford University where, after graduating in only 2-1/2 years (while also learning English), he got a PhD in humanities and history. His teaching career began at San Francisco State College, where, 41 years ago, I had the privilege of being one of his students in modern European history. This was during the years of the student uprising that occurred during 1966 to 1968 at S.F. State. Since Dr. Gregorian is a historian, this memoir is made all the more richer by historical commentary that Dr. Gregorian provides vis-à-vis autobiographical events. His teaching career moves from S.F. State (where he took a year off to go to Afghanistan to study and write a classic book on Afghanistan) to the University of Texas at Austin, then to the University of Pennsylvania where he became Provost. This story makes the trials, tribulations and infighting that go on in universities actually interesting. When Dr. Gregorian took over the presidency of the New York Public Library in 1981, it was suffering from extreme neglect due to New York's financial crises in the late 1970's when NYC was on the edge of bankruptcy. Besides his talent for creative administration, his personal virtues attract the rich and famous (i.e., Brooke Astor, Barbara Walters) to help him achieve his financial objectives for restoring the library. He turned the New York Public Library from a dissipated, physically crumbling institution back to a vibrant educational center in New York City. If you live in New York City, you might have noticed the regeneration of Bryant Park; he was also mostly responsible for that. Following nine years as President of Brown University, Dr. Gregorian became President of the Carneige Corporation, where he is today. For American autobiographies, I can't recommend this book highly enough.

Education, street smart (partially due to his street friends of youth), networking ability, social skills, socializing selectively among the most influential, are contributors to this author's achievements in life thus far.

It would be worth while for Mr. Gregorian to use his skills and experiences in helping today's independent Armenia.

Vartan Gregorian's autobiographic tract, "A Road to Home," tells an extraordinary story. It is the quintessential American Success Story. Here is an Armenian immigrant who comes from a village in Northern Iran, with his high school education completed in Jemaran, the Armenian School of considerable note in Beirut, who earns a BA and a PhD from Stanford (in history, specialty: Afghanistan), teaches at San Francisco State and UT, Austin, ends up being Dean, Provost and almost the President of U. Penn., rescues and forges the renaissance of the New York City public library system from imminent disaster by taking over as president for eight years, becomes the president of Brown University for the next nine years and along the way, turns down the Chancellorship of UC Berkeley, the Presidency of Columbia Univ., Univ. of Miami, Univ. of Michigan, Univ. of Rochester and many others, before becoming president of the Carnegie Corporation.

That pinnacle of academic positions of leadership, the presidency of a university, is not a chance given to very many people. That privilege of being the visionary leader of an institution of higher learning (as well as its chief fund raiser) is reserved to the best of the best and Vartan Gregorian has been one of the most sought after candidates for that post over the last twenty years being on almost everyone's short list! To say that he went from humble beginnings to the very top of the intellectual and academic life in America is to considerably understate the miracles that have paved the way of this deserving and gifted man's life journey. The perilous road that has lead him to the zenith of what America has to offer a scholar is depicted with great humility and panache in the pages of "The Road to Home," a Simon and Schuster 2003 publication. Everyone interested in how fate outstrips logic and predictability ought to read this book. Here is the chronicle of how the brilliance of a kid is first noted and appreciated enough somehow (by a French consular Attache' who happens to be Armenian) and then rewarded and protected by a long chain of benefactors and friends in the middle East (mostly Armenians) and in America (Armenians and many more non Armenians) both, catapulting a strange boy in great need for love and acceptance to shine as an intellectual and scholar, to conquer the toughest of tasks as an administrator, mediator, moderator, visionary, fund raiser, diplomat, keeper of the faith, lighter of the torch of knowledge and learning in Philadelphia, in New York City, in Providence, Rhode Island and in New York City again where, since 1997, he has been the president of the Carnegie Corporation which is a philanthropic organization of great weight and import in the cultural life of America and indeed the world. There are many immigrant stories that make America's spinning roulette wheel of success seem impossible to believe. Here is another such spectacular tale told by the master communicator himself, the staunch believer in education, the power of books, the beauty of scholarship and a man who has found his niche in high society and academe in America against impossible odds.

Imagine a young boy in Tabriz, Iran, born in 1934 to Armenian parents in this Northern Province of Persia known as Azerbaijan. His mother, Shoushig, dies when he is six and a half years old. Together with his little sister Ojik, he is raised by their maternal grandmother, Voski Mirzaian. Her's is the strongest and most lasting influence on this poor boy's life. She is mother and father and grandmother to them since their father is never around, working elsewhere, such as near oil fields, to make ends meet, and is never a warm father anyway, even when he is around. In fact, he is a strange, cold, distant, remarried man who never encourages little Vartanig, never teaches him anything (even though he gives private English lessons to others), never gives him any sort of advice or love of any sort! These circumstances alone ought to be enough to scar a man for life and make it hard for him to have sufficient self-confidence to make it in this cruel world. Add to that the changing of hands of their province between Persia and Soviet Russia, the Second World War, depravity, being part of a Christian Minority in an overwhelmingly Muslim city and country, poverty, lack of food, clothing, proper shelter, constant peril and it is a miracle indeed that this boy grew up to amount to anything at all. The details of these harrowing times are depicted with great care and meticulous detail in the first fifth of the book, The Road to Home. Here we have the familiar positive influence of the Armenian Church, becoming an acolyte and developing a very warm relationship with the steady, ancient tradition of the liturgy and faith that is the hallmark of the Armenian Apostolic tradition. The solace Vartanig derives from these experiences acts as a counterweight to the lack of love and nourishment at home under his father's roof with his younger wife who cares very little for him or his sister. Vartan has his grandmother who teaches him wisdom, myth, faith, morality, history and traditional Armenian tall tails all brewed in one living magic cauldron. Stars and winds and ghosts and other mythological figures intermingle and fire up this precocious boy's imagination as a steady nightly diet administered by his grandmother and her tender loving care. It is remarkable how much of this he reproduces more than fifty years later in the pages of his autobiography. His is a genuine and profound love for his grandmother. Plus, he is far too intelligent not to absorb all he can learn from her about life and this world naturally. Vartan grows and observes the changing world around him. Soviet communists come and go, muslem extremism is always suspected to be a palpable threat to the Armenians and to all Christian boys and girls in particular. Pedophiliacs must be avoided and are rumored to be all around. Street fights with Muslim boys are routine. Vartan reaches his teen years, attending school with worn out shoes, without money to buy books but able to read everything written in Armenian he can get his hands on at the library of the Armenian church and community center. He then starts to write for the Armenian newspaper "Alik" as well about daily affairs and even deliver eulogies at the funeral of important Armenian citizens of Tabriz. From these surroundings, he is somehow able to extricate himself at the age of fifteen at the bold suggestion of the French Vice-consul, Edgar Maloyan, who instructs him he go to Beirut and attend high school at Jemaran. The first turning point or plot point of this story is his grandmother authorizing his departure knowing that it is best for him and his future to leave their village and embrace the larger world. The crown jewel of Armenian schools in Beirut in the fifties with an emphasis on French (and Arabic) instruction and a thorough Armenian education including classical Armenian and Armenian history and culture beyond a normal high school degree was Nshan Palanjian Jemaran. But such a school was simply unreachable for a poor boy from Tabriz whose father would not be of any help and who spoke no Arabic or French to begin with! But he did manage to go to Beirut on his own with just $50 to his name, find people to sponsor him, to take him under their wings, nurture him, find money for him, donate food, arrange make shift dwelling at some sort of "Hotel Luxe" until boarding school facilities were inaugurated a few years hence, and even teach him French on the side so that he could catch up and graduate a few years behind schedule but brilliantly. This unlikely passage to Beirut and an institution of higher learning, makes Vartan think of the words of Graham Greene who once said and he quotes: " There is always one moment in childhood when the door opens and lets the future in." That was Vartan's moment.

It is at Jemaran that his knack for being noticed, appreciated, aided and nurtured takes root in earnest. In Beirut, in the early and middle nineteen fifties, around the intellectual community of Jemaran, many notable Armenians take on his cause. Chief among them is Simon Vratsian, the principal of the school. Vartan becomes one of the unofficial secretaries of this honorable Armenian intellectual who was the last prime minister of the first Armenian Republic before Armenia fell into the clutches of the Soviet empire in 1920. Vartan reads and learns all he can get his hands on at Jemaran. In addition, he writes many of Vratsian's letters since Simon is almost blind by then. Vartan, through this experience, if nothing else, becomes groomed for academic administration since he is exposed to it at a very early age and in all its multiple facets of fund raising and community affairs and public relations and vision and rigor and all other aspects of pedagogy. Vartan, in need of a father figure, in need of people to believe in him and encourage him, finds many in Beirut and in Jemaran, all of which is delicately and precisely depicted in The Road to Home. He completes the entire venerable "Hayakidagan" (Armenology) course, reads voraciously, learns about life in the fast and wild town which Beirut was in the 1950s and graduates with honors ready to be shipped out to the West coast where he is accepted in Stanford. Le Petit Paris, as Beirut is referred to, makes a man out of him and a man hungry for knowledge.

The next fifth of the book is about his spectacular career at Stanford both as an undergraduate and graduate student. Again, his brilliance and remarkable attributes are detected by professors who become his champions for life! He is helped by these historians and scholars throughout his academic journey. They see a future for him he cannot even imagine and take it upon themselves to walk him through the steps to achieve greatness! Vartan is appreciated and guided by giants in his field who pave the way for him and are always rewarded by how well he does, given these opportunities. Instead of being supported by Jemaran throughout his stay at Stanford, he receives University support at the end of two years, finishes his BA that quickly and starts his graduate program right then and there. He has a rich life at Stanford, which molds him further as a man and as a scholar. He meets his future wife there and marries her in such spectacular fashion that I do not want to spoil it by paraphrasing the story here. You will have to read pages 132-135 to see for yourself. Clare Russell learns Armenian and becomes his mate for life from that time on. Theirs is a happy marriage and one where the journey is shared and burdens distributed and hardships met with equal courage and valor on both their parts.

And its not that Vartan does not put Clare in harm's way! For starters, he receives a substantial travel and research grant to spend time in London, Paris, Beirut, Kabul and Karachi. His aim is to gather the raw data for his thesis on Afghanistan's transition to becoming a modern state. He takes Clare along for this trip but she is already pregnant so by the time they arrive in Beirut, she gives birth and stays there while Vartan goes to Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan and back on his own. This remarkable woman now has to fend for herself in a hotel room (where the giant cockroaches are described in vivid detail in the book) with a newborn son! She does so with the help of all the same cast of characters associated with Jemaran and the thriving Armenian community in Beirut when Vartan was there alone 6 years earlier. History repeats itself, Vartan avails himself of the generosity and friendship of old acquaintances and his research makes very good progress.

Back to California they come and a job as a history instructor at San Francisco State University. Why? Because there are no jobs that can be arranged at AUB or Jemaran in Beirut! Vartan would have loved staying in Beirut. He tries and his meteoric rise to the top of US academic circles is because there are no suitable teaching jobs for him in Beirut! Lucky for us, one could say. Vartan faces the middle to late sixties in San Francisco. A less than ideal choice given the turmoil at the local Universities then, the hippy movement, the sit ins, the Black Panthers, the anti-war movement... It is a mess and a new assistant professor has to face it all in a hot seat that was SF State. Not as bad as Berkeley, as the book explains, but close.

It is no surprise then that the newly minted PhD who is barely able to make ends meet with an academic salary at a state school (living with a wife and son) and teaching part time here and there including Stanford and other colleges, welcomes the chance to go to the university of Texas, after a short stint at UCLA and teach at a research university with a graduate program and be a historian. His book "The Emergence of Modern Afghanistan: Politics of Reform and Modernization, 1880-1946" was just then accepted for publication by Stanford University press. In the meantime, He visits Beirut again and Armenia and hopes to write a book on the modern history of that country. Instead, he gets involved in University politics down in Austin. He is asked to help the dean and that work eventually lands him in the middle of political infighting within factions of the faculty and the administration. The Road to Home describes this in great detail in chapter 10. Vartan Gregorian, learns to be an active player in University politics at UT. He then takes an endowed chair in Armenian studies at U Penn. and escapes the firings and turmoil that leave no friendly faces down in Texas. He also joins the history department of this prestigious ivy league school and embarks on the fast track career to high level university administration. He first becomes the founding dean of the college of arts and sciences at the age of thirty five! This is followed by heroic efforts at organizing the university for the bicentennial of our nation in 1976, a major fund raising campaign, and the attainment of the top academic post of Provost. Dr. Gregorian learns what its like to deal with the board of Trustees of a university and all the internal politics and machinations that would make the chatter at the Tower of Babel sound like a Gregorian Chant. He perseveres, helps solve many of U Penn's problems and sets a very good course for the university. Alas, there is opposition to his ascension to the post of President. In the meantime, he agonizes over the offer of being Berkeley's Chancellor, a lifelong dream of his and ultimate goal throughout his early academic career. He decides to stay at Penn because he is told he should finish what he started. He is told that he is a shoe in for the presidency. He should just wait and assume the helm. Alas, he is blocked at the end and many of the fat cats who are trustees of the university who do not like him are, let us say, blue bloods, who do not believe he would have the "social graces" (or the looks, perhaps) for such a job... Hmm... racism? You bet! Discrimination against a darker skinned, curly haired, short Armenian man whose brilliance and dedication and virtues they could not see? Surely! Philadelphia is well depicted in this book as being full of "Mayflower" syndrome suffering WASPs. Poor Vartan falls victim to their ingrate state.

But, the star of this story ascends far beyond a stuffy old school's board room antics and lands as the savior of the New York City Public Library system. This eighty nine distinct branch or property system which was at the verge of collapse and irreversible decay is resurrected under the able leadership of Dr. Gregorian for eight long years of fourteen hour days and double lunches and double dinners and fund raising and consciousness raising activities and innovations and vision setting leadership. At the completion of that renovation campaign he finally accepts the presidency of an Ivy League School, Brown University, in Providence Rhode Island. His nine years there reorient that school towards a far more successful path and improve its minority and gender distribution and hiring practices and many other modern innovations that take Brown to a far higher ground of success than it was in 1989 when Dr. Gregorian took over its helm.

The latest chapter in the career of this tireless and remarkable man dedicated to academia, scholarship, libraries, books, teaching and a life of the mind is to head up the Carnegie Corporation, which is a charitable organization of the first caliber dedicated to the betterment of the world through the dissemination of knowledge. Dr. Gregorian is a happy man from all appearances. He is a tireless advocate for causes he believes in with a passion. His enthusiasm is contagious. He sets courses for action and follows through with them till the end. He is a no nonsense achiever who has aided many a worthwhile cause with absolute dedication and imperturbable resolve. He has never rested on his laurels nor has he taken the easy way out.

One could imagine that being an Armenian and an immigrant gave Dr. Gregorian the advantage over more traditional local talent. He sure had something to prove and he was hungry throughout the journey. He appreciated all that was done for him and he took none of it for granted. He wanted to make his life mean something. He knew of the Armenian genocide and the displacement of his people. He knew that an Armenian owes his being alive to divine fate and that squandering his life away and the opportunities so many had sacrificed so much to make possible for him would be cruelly wasted if it were not his task to make them all proud. As this book shows, one can not praise this dedicated administrator enough for all the potential he has unleashed in New York, Philadelphia and Rhode Island by untiring dedication and a principled approach to the betterment of this land of freedom he has adopted as his own.

My only criticism of the book is that it leaves so much out! There is so much more one would have liked to hear him describe and discuss. For instance, and this is just the tip of the iceberg, how did he perceive the differences between the Armenians he met in Beirut from the Iranian Armenians he knew back in Tabriz and Teheran? How about the Armenian communities in the SF bay area and Philadelphia, NY and Providence? Any differences and similarities there, he would care to dissect for us? What happened to his book on Armenia? Are there notes left of that work? His research and plans? Is that water under the bridge now? Did he ever produce any graduate students of his own in Texas or U Penn? What are his PhD students up to, if he has had any? That is, what is his intellectual legacy as a scholar? And another thing, what does he think of Afghanistan today? The book makes reference to 9-11 and to unrelated speeches he has given in 2002. How about Afghanistan? He was, after all, a world expert in this arena at one point not so long ago. Similarly, what efforts has he made on behalf of the Armenian cause or for free and independent Armenia since 1991? What are his views on how Armenia's intellectual capital can be preserved or augmented? What can we do and what course of action would he suggest given his vast experience at administering universities and charitable organizations? It would help a lot if he would write publicly and let everyone know what he sees as a best coarse of action. Dr. Gregorian is an asset of immeasurable proportions to a community that can only be awed and proud to call him one of their own. In short, read The Road to Home. Its message to all Armenians and Americans seems to be, you can find a home (after all) if you keep your eyes wide open in this land of vast opportunity.

I first learned of Vartan Gregorian when he became provost of the University of Pennsylvania while I was attending grad school there. He was a colorful figure who seemed to be as much at odds with the university as the contentious students during the turbulent late 70's. Later, he went on to head the New York Public Library and then Brown University. He seemed to have a magical way to become influential and well-liked. After reading this book, I liked him a lot and wished I'd had a chance to know him while I was at Penn. Gregorian is a man of letters and great charisma.

Gregorian's story of his life is as charming as his public persona. From the opening lines about his life in Tabriz, Iran as a member of the Armenian minority community there, to his wise grandmother who raised him, his life is exciting and fraught with tragedy and pitfalls. His mother dies in childbirth and his father essentially abandons the family. Somehow, Vartan manages to find an education despite great difficulties and he is sponsored finally to go to the Armenian University in Beirut. From there, his career as a professor and man of letters takes off and he soars, always helped by friends of influence who provide that wind under his wings. And he's grateful. He moves some thirty times (not thirty jobs, as he points out) and goes from Stanford to Texas to Penn, to New York and places in between. All along he meets luminaries like Jackie Kennedy Onassis, the Queen of England, makes friends with former BU president John Silber and yet seems to stay folksy and unaffected by all the glitter.

The book is highly readable and a fine memoir--whether you've heard of Gregorian or not, this is a wonderful tale about a man who overcame ridiculously bad odds to become one of America's most influential public figures in education. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Many great childhood memories were cooked up from this book in my house...we grew up on some of these favorites...even the one for "American" stuffing (dressing) - I've never come across anyone who didn't love the recipes from Rose's book.

My mother gave me a signed copy of Rose's book when I got married in 1960. The cover is falling off, and the pages are stained, but it's the best! This book has authentic recipes, and the food tastes just as if my mother, grandmother and mother-in-law cooked them. I always know that what I prepare will turn out as expected, and my family will love.

My 3 children also have copies of this wonderful book. My one son got his from Amazon.com!

Paree achorghag! that means good appetite, in Armenian

My Grandfather (Robert Baboian)'s mother wrote this book. It is a very good Armenian Cookbook. I like the recipe for pilaf the most because pilaf is excellent.

I really love this cookbook! I have about quite a few Armenian cookbooks, but this one is becoming one of my favorites. I am Armenian, born in the USA, and have grown up on Armenian food. My parents were from Egypt, and my mother is an excellent cook. Sometimes I enjoy surprising her with Armenian dishes she hasn't had in quite some time, and the recipes in this book come out right and tasting authentic, even without her input! Rose has also written some silly little poems about her recipes, and it just makes me smile picturing this Armenian lady including little rhymes about her recipes! There are no photos, but there are different versions of dishes, as well as different amounts based on portion size, which is really a useful tool. I think this book is a real bargain for anyone who would like to try cooking some Armenian dishes. Whether you are a beginner, or a seasoned cook, The variety of Armenian dishes and Rose Baboian's light writing style will make this a favorite in your cookbook collection.

I received a copy of this book from my mother-in-law many years ago. She used it before me and taught me to cook my husband's favorite foods from it. I have tried other Armenian cookbooks over the years and NONE compare to this one for its authenticity and simplicity. You will find the paklava, lahmejoun, kufte, beurek, madzoon, and dolma recipies excellent and timeless.

I have used the book so much that the cover is now falling off and I need a new copy. I never thought I'd still find it available. I plan to get two extra copies for my two sons and I highly recommend it to those who want to learn traditional Armenian recipes.