Why Do We Choose The Stories We Write?

 

 Under the Almond Tree is the story of an Afghan family fleeing the conflict and violence of Afghanistan in the 1990s during the rise of the Taliban, travelling back and forth on the Trans-Siberian Express in search of safety, as narrated by the middle daughter, storyteller Samar.  Helped by Napoleon, the ticket collector, and her beloved copy of Anna Karenina, Samar shares her family’s story.  It is a story of love, hope and survival against seemingly impossible odds.

So why did I choose to write this story?

Prior to working on my first novel, I was Director of PEN International – the worldwide writers’ organisation campaigning on freedom of expression issues and promoting literature globally.  Working with writers and activists I was deeply affected by many stories of individuals who had been forced into exile and had had to begin over, somewhere new, leaving behind their home countries.  That resilience and strength of spirit is something I wanted to pay tribute to through this particular story.

Today, according to UNHCR, globally there are over 65 million forcibly displaced people – families and individuals uprooted from their homes by conflict and poverty.  Of that figure over 21 million are refugees, and over half of all refugees are children and teenagers.  These figures are almost impossible to comprehend, to imagine the individual stories of each person – the challenges they face, the way the world must look when you have lost everything.

In choosing to write about the 1990s and the fall of communism, I wanted to explore what happens when an ideology collapses and a society undergoes first the turmoil of radical political and social change, then has to adapt to new ‘norms’ and ways of being.  Writing about Afghanistan, Russia and Central Asia enabled me to look at those issues in a way removed from, although sadly resonating with, the current refugee crisis we are all witnessing today.

I hope the story can also help draw attention back to Afghanistan. The Afghan people have suffered and continue to suffer greatly due to conflict and power struggles. Generations are growing up without security, stability or hope of change.  There are 2.7million refugees globally from Afghanistan – second only in numbers to the current refugee crisis faced by the Syrian people.  Yet Afghanistan now feels forgotten.  So I wanted to draw attention to that and through this story look too at how we repeat the mistakes of the past, and the repercussions of that for our humanity.

Before working at PEN, I was Director for the Global Girls Fund, raising funds to empower and enable young women around the world to access opportunities to learning that would otherwise have been denied to them – from that, and other youth charity work, comes my deep interest in girls’ education and the desire to write about lives in which that safe route to learning is taken away.  In the novel, Samar and her siblings struggle to gain a normal education or to experience a stable childhood – these were issues that concerned me and that I wanted to explore in the writing.

Having grown up in Northern Ireland during the 1980s and the time of the Troubles there, I saw early on how conflict can shape a nation, can mould daily interactions and relationships, how identity politics can divide and separate people.  I knew from a young age that I didn’t see the world in those divisive terms and that I believed, and still do, that we share much more in common than the things that divide us.  From an early age I started learning other languages, travelling, learning about the world around me beyond the borders of my own country.  That desire to connect to and understand others is at the heart of all of my writing.

The novel also pays tribute to the power of the imagination and storytelling, to the many ways in which stories can sustain us – even in the darkest of times.

Under the Almond Tree is a story about family, love and hope – these are things to which I believe we can all relate, regardless of our own personal stories.

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Under the Almond Tree will be published on 23 February 2017 (Two Roads Books / John Murray Press) and in translation around the world through 2017/18.  Laura is currently working on her second novel, The Plantation House, and writing the screenplay for her debut novel.  

Find out more at  www.lauramcveigh.com 

 

ABOUT UNDER THE ALMOND TREE

If you lost everything you loved, how would you survive and begin again? Under the Almond Treetells the story of one refugee family fleeing Afghanistan and the catastrophic effects of war and displacement.

Fifteen year old Samar and her family are refugees, fleeing the conflict in 1990s Kabul, after the Russians and then the Taliban, turn their lives inside out. They are aboard the Trans-Siberian Express as it travels across Russia towards an uncertain future. With the help of Napoleon, the ticket collector, her beloved copy of Anna Karenina, and her family, Samar narrates the story of their epic journey away from their happy life in Kabul and everything they have known. But, as Samar’s tale unfolds, and the secrets of the family are unearthed, we slowly discover that the truth is far more devastating – and more full of hope – than we could ever have imagined.

Under the Almond Tree is a story of how we keep the truth from those we love, and even from ourselves, to hold on to the beliefs which underpin our lives. It’s also the story of extraordinary resilience and courage, in a turbulent world where nothing can be relied upon, but everything is possible.

BUY UNDER THE ALMOND THREE HERE

 

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Category: On Writing