This is a biography and family history of five generations of an Assyrian Christian family as told through the eyes of the scion of their family Sam Sarmecanic. It begins with his grandparents generation and the flight to Iraq to escape genocide and covers his father's emigration to Chicago in the early 20th century by himself at age 9, his return to Urmia and Golpachan village as an adult, the agrarian life of seasonal migration between village and town, Sam's education in Tehran, his studies in London, his founding of a civil engineering firm which became one of the best in Iran, the...

This book is a non fiction autobiographical account of an American expat's experiences with Iranians and Iran. It is a series of 12 short stories in chronological order. At age eleven he went to boarding school in Rome with the grandson of Sardar Homayoun who was offered the monarchy of Iran by the British rather than Reza Shah but he turned it down because he dwas a freind of the last Qajar King Ahmad Shah and a coup would have invoved killing his compatriots. The author went to Iran for the first time alone and stayed with the family of his best friend for the summer of 1966. He then...