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Laleh Khadivi

Laleh Khadivi was born in Esfahan, Iran, and is the author of The Age of Orphans, the first book in a trilogy that follows three generations of Kurdish men as they leave southwestern Iran and immigrate to Los Angeles. She is the recipient of the 2008 Whiting Award, a Carl Djerassi Fiction Fellowhip, and a finalist for the 2010 Rolex Mentor-Protégé Award. Khadivi has directed and produced documentary films for A&E, Showtime, and HBO. She is now at work on her second novel, The Walking.

Author

Inside Iran: Introduction

What is the genesis of art in a repressive society? In Iran, repression has ruled in one form or another for the last half century and still, the voice of the people rings out around it. As Iran’s recent manifestations of state power take a brazen and unapologetic turn, the creative spirit of the populace has come forth—in poetry, comics, music and prose, blogs, and photography—its pulse beating strongly amid the bloodshed.

Air and Water

Winter 2009 | Fiction

The day care is run out of an old boxing gym where corrugated tin ceilings spread like sky and the glossed cement floors are always cold to the touch. Tucked into a northern corner of Long Beach, far past the beach and not so far past the oil refineries, the gym sits at the end of an L-shaped strip mall, an abandoned ghost town of leftover linoleum and lambent fluorescent lights floats in a sea of parking lot that spreads endlessly in every direction.