Short-listed for the Thomas Cook/The Daily Telegraph Travel Book Award 2001 
'If I had to choose a colour to charcterise Iran, I would choose black: the colour worn by the women and the men, the colour of the crepe that decorates the streets and houses during religious celebrations, the colour of the country's riches: oil and caviar.' 
Ana Briongos first travelled to Iran in the 1960s. She returned in the early 1970s to study Persian at the University of Tehran and has continued to return to this country of contradictions ever since. But Black on Black is not so much her own story as that of her friends and acquaintances. Ultimately, all her tales are about coming to terms with the consequences of the Islamic Revolution of 1979. 
Ana describes the everyday life of the people she meets and visits. These quiet, domestic moments build, like the pieces of mosaic, into an intricate portrait of a country where things are not always as they appear. With a disarming gentleness, Ana reveals a country far more complex - both now and in its 'liberal' days under the Shah - than television soundbites have led us to believe.

Black on Black: Iran Revisited

Literature & Fiction

Briongos, Ana M.

History & Criticism

Lonely Planet

In 1968, with Franco still in power, 21-year-old Ana M. Briongos left her native city of Barcelona for the first time and went to Afghanistan. Staying first in Kandahar, then in Kabul, it was not long before she fell in love with this fascinating country. Between 1968 and 1977, she would return there many times. In her quest for self-discovery, she encountered a cast of characters worthy of a novel, from street vendors in the bazaar to members of the country's ruling class and relatives of the Afghan royal family. Ana M. Briongos was also very privileged to be given a rare and intriguing glimpse behind the veil into the hidden world of Afghan women. "Winter in Kandahar" offers a personal recollection of an Afghanistan that no longer exists: that of the final years of a forty-year-old monarchy on the verge of collapse. The book provides an insight into Afghanistan's complex system of clans and tribes, as well as a compelling account of the country's troubled history. The friendships Ana Briongos cemented during those years are still very much alive; this book represents a tribute to the survival of friendship through adversity against a backdrop of adventure and intrigue.

Winter in Kandahar

Trotamundas Press

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Briongos, Ana M.. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Briongos, Ana M.

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Briongos, Ana M.. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Black on Black: Iran Revisited

Winter in Kandahar