Pebbles in the Rice: My Life in Iran

Set during the turbulent time that resulted in the Iranian revolution, this memoir chronicles my life as the 6-foot tall, blue-eyed American bride of an infamous Iranian student activist. From braving a 14-year-old in a brand new military uniform pointing his recently issued AK 47 at my pregnant belly, to accidentally being appointed the ＂official＂ US delegate to the international conference of non-aligned countries, Pebbles in the Rice: My Life in Iran reveals, reports and remembers the sights, smells and nuances of Iran’s people and culture during the turbulent time immediately prior to, and after, the Iranian Revolution of 1979.
Pebbles in the Rice: My Life in Iran is the must-have, background color commentary companion that puts the current political situation in Iran in an understandable, personalized and compelling context. It answers the rhetorical question: Shouldn’t we get to know a people before we bomb them?
It is a first-person chronicle of the political and historical events at the center of the birth of modern Islamic fundamentalism that is as relevant today as it was thirty years ago. From my first arrival in Tehran in 1978, when I was introduced to the power of Khomeini by a relative who would later join with other students and seize the U. S. Embassy, to braving the home invasion of the local militia who arrested my husband, my life in Iran was far from the mundane existence of an expat housewife.
Returning to the U. S. in 1982 and narrowly escaping the capture, imprisonment and execution suffered by our friends and relations, Pebbles in the Rice: My Life in Iran chronicles the end of my marriage to my Iranian husband and his untimely death.

In 1977, I married one of the founders of the Iranian student anti-Shah movement in the United States and my political horizons broadened. In 1978, I took an inaugural flight to Tehran--and it changed my life forever. I met a young nephew who would later participate in the seizure of the U.S. Embassy that fateful day in November 1979. I experienced the palpable electricity of a nation on the verge of revolution. I returned to share and to warn; however, cautionary impressions were met with polite disinterest.

In 1979, after twenty years in exile, my husband returned to his country with ten suitcases and me, his American bride. Three short years later, in 1982, we fled with our new infant son, one bag and ＄500 sewn into the waistband of his pants. During the intervening years between my arrival and escape, I learned the language, experienced the culture, watched my husband being taken from our home in the middle of the night by local vigilantes, secretly aided the anti-regime activists, was appointed an official delegate to a conference attended by Ramsey Clark to help get an American woman out of jail, had an Ak47 pointed at my pregnant belly while thugs searched my home and, regardless, came to love the subtle nuance and grace of a people we now love to hate.

Forty years, two more sons and an amicable divorce later, I continue my almost evangelical love affair with Iran. I am a seasoned public speaker and have made appearances on The Phil Donohue Show and The Merv Griffin Show. I worked as the public relations director of a women’s clinic, organizing interviews and features with Geraldo Rivera, Playboy magazine. I completed a national speaking tour on Iran with programs in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Austin, Dallas, Houston, Birmingham, Madison, Chicago, Cincinnati, Detroit, Portland, Seattle, Honolulu and appeared on innumerable local television morning shows, in all major market radio stations. I am no stranger to marketing. A practicing family law attorney in Pleasant Hill, California, I am compelled to think on my feet while addressing controversy on a daily basis.