Salar Abdoh is an Iranian novelist and essayist. He is also a director of the graduate program in Creative Writing at the City College of New York at the City University of New York.
Background
Abdoh was born in 1965, in Tehran, Iran, the son of Ali Abdoh, a prominent athlete, businessman and founder of the Persepolis Football Club, and Homa Mohajerin. Abdoh had two brothers. When he was fourteen, his family was forced to leave Iran for the United States. His father passed away six months after they arrived in the United States, leaving his teenage sons homeless. After a period of living on the streets of Los Angeles, all three eventually settled down and pursued challenging careers. Sardar became an engineer, Reza a well-known director and playwright, and Salar a professor of English literature.
Education
Abdoh earned an undergraduate degree from the University of California, Berkeley, and received a Master's from the City College of New York.
Career
Abdoh's first book, The Poet Game, a spy novel about Islamic terrorism in the United States, discusses a problem that is very close to his heart. Islamic fundamentalists drove Abdoh, his father, and two brothers from their native Iran shortly after the revolution of 1979.
Many reviewers commented about the ambitious scope of Abdoh's first novel. The Poet Game "balances bombing conspiracies and international arms trading with literary allusions and psychological intrigue," noted a Publishers Weekly contributor. Protagonist Sami Amir is sent to New York by the Iranian government to stop a plot by Islamic terrorists to blow up city landmarks. But first, Amir has to figure out which of the many competing groups in New York is the real threat. Libyans, an American arms dealer, a Pakistani bomb-maker, and a beautiful American spy posing as a stripper are all "vividly described," thought the Publishers Weekly reviewer.
Abdoh confirmed that the plot for his novel was inspired in part by the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center and draws on the real-life clandestine struggles between various terrorist groups and intelligence services.
His second novel, Opium, tells the story of a young American who used to work as a drug-runner along the Afghan/Iran border during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Years later, living in New York and trying to keep a low profile, his past suddenly catches up with him as the US is gearing up to invade Afghanistan and Iraq.
Abdoh has also published short stories and essays on war and politics in numerous journals; in 2010 he edited Callaloo Journal's issue of Middle East and North Africa writers. Abdoh also co-wrote the play Quotations from a Ruined City with his older brother, Reza Abdoh, the world famous avant-garde theater director. The play was first produced in 1994.
