The Taliban Cricket Club

April 30, 2012
Murari's newest (after Taj) is set in Kabul, Afghanistan in 2000, and tells the harrowing tale of an educated young newspaperwoman during the Taliban's rule, when "Women must be seen only in the home and in the grave." Rukhsana supports her dying widowed mother and teenaged brother by writing stories secreted outside the country and published pseudonymously. But Rukhsana fears her journalistic cover is blown when summoned by Zorak Wahidi, head of the Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice. He wants journalists to promote a cricket tournament in a misguided bid to win diplomatic accolades for the Taliban. Though woman are not allowed to compete, Rukhsana played cricket at college in India, and so disguises herself as a man to coach her brother and cousins in order to get them out of Afghanistan. But when Wahidi asks for Rukhsana's hand in marriage, she must navigate dangerous social territory in an effort to remain free, and stay alive. Murari's storytelling works best when exploring the daily horrors of Taliban rule, but is less successful in elucidating Rukhsana's conflicted loyalties. Though descriptions of the wildly popular game can be dull, a thrilling climax and atypical story line (one that has roots in real lifeâthe Taliban really did try to put together a cricket team in 2000) make this well worth a read. Fans of Khaled Hosseini's A Thousand Splendid Suns will be especially pleased .

May 1, 2012
Indian filmmaker and novelist Murari (Taj, 2005, etc.) offers a romantic feel-good about Afghanistan circa 2000, not without its share of grim fundamentalism but heavy on the optimism. Educated Afghanis who chafe under the harsh restrictions of the fundamentalist government, plucky 24-year-old Rukhsana and her 16-year-old brother, Jahan, live with their cancer-ridden widowed mother in Kabul. No longer allowed to work as a journalist, Rukhsana still manages to send out anonymous stories of life under Taliban rule to the Hindustan Times in Delhi where she lived with her family in happier times--she attended college and fell in love with Hindu Veer although she gave him up when she returned to Afghanistan, knowing her parents would not approve. One day she and other journalists are called to the Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice by Zorak Wahidi, the same man who slapped and physically threatened Rukhsana at a newspaper office four years earlier. Wahidi announces that the Taliban is forming a cricket team as a propaganda tool to show the government's capacity for civility and sportsmanship. The newspapers are to announce that a competition will be held among Afghani teams to decide who gets to compete internationally in Pakistan. Rukhsana, who played cricket on her college team in Delhi, realizes that cricket may be the way to get Jahan out of Afghanistan. She puts together a team of cousins, all of whom want to escape Afghanistan, and disguises herself as a man in order to coach the ragtag band into a competitive force within three short weeks. Fortunately she is wearing her fake beard and goes unrecognized when Wahidi's even more malevolent brother shows up to announce that Wahidi wants to marry Rukhsana. The stakes for winning the cricket match have increased dramatically. Not to worry, Rukhsana is not only smart, beautiful, loyal and beloved, she and her ever-growing band of conspirators are also darn lucky. Readers will be of two minds, whether Murari's Bend It Like Beckham approach to Taliban repression is trivializing or uplifting.

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March 15, 2012

When the Taliban's Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice announces that they are sponsoring a cricket tournament, with the winning team receiving training in Pakistan, the brother and cousins of Rukhsana, a female journalist living in Kabul, Afghanistan, see it as their means of escape from the oppressive regime. Disguised as a man, Rukhsana, who learned cricket while at college in India, trains her male relatives. Meanwhile, she plans her own escape via her fiance in America, a man she doesn't love. VERDICT Fans of Khaled Hosseini's The Kite Runner will here find a similarly uplifting story about good people surviving their horrific circumstances. Murari finds flashes of humor in unexpected places, such as a scene in which Rukhsana and her grandmother learn to walk in a burka. Some plot contrivances toward the end defy plausibility, and the characters other than Rukhsana are thinly drawn, but overall Murari has crafted a tense, compelling story.--Christine DeZelar-Tiedman, Univ. of Minnesota Libs., Minneapolis

Copyright 2012 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 1, 2012
Set in 2000 in Taliban-controlled Kabul, the latest novel by acclaimed writer and filmmaker Murari (Taj, 2005) follows a group of Afghan boys determined to win a cricket championship and change their lives. The boys have an unusual coach in their cousin, Rukhsana, who studied abroad in Delhi and played on a cricket team. A former journalist now confined to her house by the Taliban, Rukhsana sees the Taliban-sponsored cricket tournament as a chance for her brother, Jahan, and their cousins to escape Kabul, provided they can win the tournament. Rukhsana herself is waiting for her fiance, Shaheen, to send money for her to join him in America, even though her heart lies with Veer, a man she met while studying in Delhi. When a sinister Taliban minister decides he wants Rukhsana for his wife, her family puts their lives on the line to protect her. A thrilling blend of adventure, romance, and danger, Murari's novel will have readers rooting for Rukhsana and the brave team of boys she hopes to guide to victory and freedom.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)