Not without my daughter.

Betty Mahmoody, an American woman, was married with an Iranian doctor, Moody. They had got a four years old daughter called Mahtob. One day a Moody’s cousin arrived at their home to stay there for a month. Mammal, the cousin, proposed them to travel to Iran. At first, Betty didn’t want because she was scared, but finally she accepted. She thought this would protect Mahtob to not return to Iran. Her family and friends warned her because they thought that Moody will kidnap them in Iran, but she didn’t hear, she knew how Moody was and she couldn’t accept this idea, Moody was the perfect husband and father.

When they arrived to the airport all the Moody’s family was there. Betty wasn’t comfortable; the air, the smells, the clothes she had to wear… They had to stay at Ameh Bozorg´s house. Ameh was the Moody’s sister, who brought up him when their parents died. The house was extremely dirty and the smell was horrible. The first days, Moody ignored Betty and Mahtob. Betty was confused, she didn’t know what was happening to Moody, she didn’t recognize him, and she didn’t know where its sweet husband was. Both, mother and daughter were counting the days to return to America. The last day they were excited because they will leave Iran, but when Moody entered in the bedroom their hopes disappeared. Moody told them that they will stay in Iran. Betty didn’t believe it, her suspicions come true. That day started their nightmare. No one supported her, no one understood her. Escape was difficult because in those countries women are treated like animals, but she found people that help her.

Not without my daughter is the biography of Betty Mahmoody, it tells how she got over all the obstacles of the way. Her only incentive was safe Mahtob from her father and his family. The novel is situated in the Iran of the 80’s. It denounces the women’s situation on the Islamic countries and the few resources to denounce something if you don’t have power in the society.

I like so much the book because I knew that those countries were very racists with women but I didn’t know that the situation was so extreme. It makes me reconsider because not only the women that born there are condemned to life in this conditions also women that get married with Islamic men. Maybe the majority of the men are good persons and they wouldn’t do anything that could damage their wives, but some others hust and kidnap their wives.

                                                                                                    Laura Vera Costa.