She is known at home and abroad for her efforts against social and political taboos, and for her courageous books. Novels intimate only in appearance: the intertwined stories of relationships, often dramatic, hold a thousand references that tell more than many reportages, what it is like to live under dictatorship. As in “In her mirrors” an excellent translation from Elena Chiti, published in Beirut, and so far only distributed clandestinely in Syria.

“On the recording, there were pictures of young men who had received weapon training, were singing martial songs, listened to sermons and roared battle cries. It was like watching us back in the camps of the Puritan movement. Nineteen men brought death and destruction on this September day, and if I had stayed in the movement and let myself be persuaded to go to Afghanistan, I could have easily become the twentieth. I could have been an accomplice in one of history’s greatest crimes against humanity”