Martyr! (National Book Award Finalist): A Novel by Akbar, Kaveh his peer mentor and tutor

his peer mentor and tutor in college: Renny Ross

from Mae Jemison to W

is a paean to how we spend our lives seeking meaning—in faith

and anyone feeling overwhelmed and exhausted by the demands of grind culture

and refreshingly drama free

Martyr! (National Book Award Finalist): A Novel by Akbar, Kaveh his peer mentor and tutorCyrus Shams is a young man grappling with an inheritance of violence and loss: his mothers plane was shot down over the skies of the Persian Gulf in a senseless accident; and his fathers life in America was circumscribed by his work killing chickens at a factory farm in the Midwest. Cyrus is a drunk, an addict, and a poet, whose obsession with martyrs leads him to examine the mysteries of his pasttoward an uncle who rode through Iranian battlefields