The Bookseller of Kabul by Asne Seierstad

Two weeks after September 11th, award-winning journalist Åsne Seierstad went to Afghanistan to report on the conflict there. In the following spring she returned to live with an Afghan family for several months. For more than twenty years Sultan Khan defied the authorities - be they communist or Taliban - to supply books to the people of Kabul. He was arrested, interrogated and imprisoned by the communists and watched illiterate Taliban soldiers burn piles of his books in the street. He even resorted to hiding most of his stock in attics all over Kabul. But while Khan is passionate in his love of books and hatred of censorship, he is also a committed Muslim with strict views on family life. As an outsider, Seierstad is able to move between the private world of the women - including Khan's two wives - and the more public lives of the men. And so we learn of proposals and marriages, suppression and abuse of power, crime and punishment. The result is a gripping and moving portrait of a family, and a clear-eyed assessment of a country struggling to free itself from history.

- Google

The 209th greatest nonfiction book of all time


This book is on the following lists:

  1. - 68th on Top 100 World Literature Titles (Perfection Learning)
  2. - The Bigger Read List (English PEN)

Buy This Book

Name Binding Sales Rank Lowest New Lowest Used Published
Bookseller of Kabul Whsmith ed a Paperback 7103445 $6.39 $0.50 2009
The Bookseller of Kabul Paperback 902564 $3.98 $0.01 2004
The Bookseller of Kabul Hardcover 1291327 $1.93 $0.01
Bookseller of Kabul Audio CD 1947341 $228.22 $10.45 2005
The Bookseller of Kabul Hardcover 1784155 $14.56 $4.98 2004
With Their Backs To The World: Portraits from Serbia - from the bestselling author of the Bookseller of Kabul Paperback 4973536 $19.03 $2.46 2005
The Bookseller of Kabul Audio CD 2959509 $11.74 $0.88 2005
The Bookseller of Kabul Audio CD 3894103 $10.99
Bookseller of Kabul, The Kindle Edition 99374 $1.99 2003
The Bookseller of Kabul Paperback 3102838 $0.25 $0.01 2004
The Bookseller of Kabul, translated by Ingrid Christophersen Paperback 9228380 $16.10 $10.02 2003
Bookseller of Kabul Paperback 376130 $6.50 $0.99 2004