Fantastic book, I read it all in one day. I guess I am prejudiced slightly as I have always been a Januni fan but the level of information and Salman's candidness in divulging details of political events and their impact on his life made the book a very worthwhile read indeed. There are bits in the book in which Salman does get carried away slightly, like the very first chapter where he mentions Taliban smashing his guitar in a five star hotel in Lahore a bit far fetched, but than I would put this tendency down to his exposure to the American culture at an early age. But otherwise the book presents the pain felt by a liberal Muslim trying to make sense of the astronomical religious changes taking around him, fully exploited by populist political leaders like Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif taking full advantage left by the power vacuum left by the army receding back to the barracks. The vacuum was filled by the fundamentalist Muslim taking the initiative with the populist political leadership content in only appeasing the very belligerent fundamentalist Mullah parties.
I do think there is at least one glaring contradiction in his assessment of Imran Khan though, as Imran in my opinion is a populist as well but even before taking power has already tied an official knot with the political religious Jammat ul Islami (Salman's Taliban from the very first chapter) which leaves the future a forgone conclusion in my opinion, but that is my opinion.
The best chapter for me was the one where Juniad Jamshed (JJ) takes him to the Tableeghi Ijtimah to get him indoctrinated into a born-again Muslim. The narrative is very absorbing with Salman's personality really coming out. I wish more public figures are brave enough to write about their life as Salman has been.
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