Author Spotlight: John Robert Tipton

In the summer of 1977, twenty-seven-year-old John Tipton has grown weary of his job with Shell Helicopter Company in Fort Worth, Texas, and his wife has asked for a divorce. He's looking for an opportunity to leave his old life behind and start anew. That opportunity arises almost immediately when he is offered a position in Tehran, Iran. Tipton is intrigued and takes the job. After a whirlwind of preparations, Tipton moves to Iran and starts learning about the country, the culture, the people, and the challenges and rewards of living abroad. Although there is political unrest-the Ayatollah Khomeini has emerged from relative obscurity in Paris and has become the spiritual leader of a new movement-life flows relatively smoothly. In January of 1979, however, Tipton finds himself in the middle of the Iranian Revolution. The Shah has fled into exile, and it's now impossible to leave the country. Demonstrators fill the streets, and the revolutionists threaten to topple the Shah's government. Tipton's offices have been attacked, and contact with the outside world has been severed. To complicate matters, Tipton has managed to close the company's bank account, and he possesses a small fortune in Iranian riyals he must somehow return to his company. Based on author John Tipton's actual experiences while living and working in downtown Tehran during the revolution, this novel explores the 1979 Iranian Revolution from a unique perspective.