A Different Kind of Daughter: The Girl Who Hid from the Taliban in Plain Sight - Hardcover

Toorpakai, Maria

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1509800808 ISBN 13: 9781509800803

Publisher: Bluebird, 2016

Synopsis

The incredible story of a girl from tribal Pakistan who risked everything just to play, and ended up taking on the Taliban and inspiring the world.

A Different Kind of Daughter recounts Maria Toorpakai's harrowing journey to play the sport she knew was her destiny. From her early life masquerading as a boy and roaming the violent back alleys of the frontier city of Peshawar, Maria rises to become the number one female squash player in Pakistan. But for Maria, squash is not only liberation -- it is also a death sentence, thrusting her into the national spotlight and the crosshairs of the Taliban, who want Maria and her family dead. Maria knows her only chance of survival was to flee the country.
     Enter Canadian Jonathon Power, the first North American to earn the title of top squash player in the world, and the only person to heed Maria's plea for help. Recognizing her determination and talent, Jonathon invites Maria to train and compete internationally in Canada. After years of living on the run from the Taliban, Maria packs up and leaves the only place she has ever known to move halfway across the globe to pursue her dream in Toronto. Now Maria is well on the way to becoming world champion, and continues to be a voice for oppressed women everywhere.
A Different Kind of Daughter is about equality, courage, determination, parents' love, and the ability to turn to what is best in us to fight against what is worst in the world.

About this title

About the Author:

MARIA TOORPAKAI is a professional squash player, currently ranked as Pakistan's top female player and 48th in the world. As a child growing up in a highly conservative tribal area of Pakistan where girls' involvement in sport was forbidden by the local Islamic culture, Toorpakai trained and competed as a boy in Peshawar. Toorpakai currently resides and trains in Toronto, under former professional squash player Jonathon Power. Toorpakai is the sister of Ayesha Gulalai, who is a Member of the National Assembly representing Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf on a reserved seat for women. The author lives in Toronto.

Review:

“Toorpakai’s story... is mesmerizing, rendered with emotional and lyrical intensity... and as much about the mysteries of individual human lives as a larger political justice.”—Maclean’s

“Toorpakai’s appreciation of and respect for her father fill the memoir with enough love to balance the story’s most alarming horrors. . . . Toorpakai writes forcefully and clearly about the most painful elements of life under the Taliban. She does not sentimentalize or overstate. She does not engage in self-aggrandizement or self-pity. The story itself is shocking, the violence toward women enraging. Toorpakai brings that world to life for the reader with intensity and precision of expression. . . . This remarkable, powerful woman has penned an equally remarkable and powerful memoir.”—Quill and Quire
From the Hardcover edition.

About this edition

• Publisher: Bluebird
• Publication date: 2016
• ISBN 10: 1509800808
• ISBN 13: 9781509800803
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 320