Rating: 5 | ★★★★★
Release Date: August 28th, 2018
Series or Standalone: Standalone
Genre: Young Adult Fiction, Contemporary Fiction, Friendship, LGBTQIA+ Fiction, Realistic Fiction
Page Count: 316 pages
Dates Read: March 1st – 3rd, 2019
Synopsis: Darius doesn’t think he’ll ever be enough, in America or in Iran.
Darius Kellner speaks better Klingon than Farsi, and he knows more about Hobbit social cues than Persian ones. He’s about to take his first-ever trip to Iran, and it’s pretty overwhelming–especially when he’s also dealing with clinical depression, a disapproving dad, and a chronically anemic social life. In Iran, he gets to know his ailing but still formidable grandfather, his loving grandmother, and the rest of his mom’s family for the first time. And he meets Sohrab, the boy next door who changes everything.
Sohrab makes sure people speak English so Darius can understand what’s going on. He gets Darius an Iranian National Football Team jersey that makes him feel like a True Persian for the first time. And he understands that sometimes, best friends don’t have to talk. Darius has never had a true friend before, but now he’s spending his days with Sohrab playing soccer, eating rosewater ice cream, and sitting together for hours in their special place, a rooftop overlooking the Yazdi skyline.
Sohrab calls him Darioush–the original Persian version of his name–and Darius has never felt more like himself than he does now that he’s Darioush to Sohrab. When it’s time to go home to America, he’ll have to find a way to be Darioush on his own. (GR.)
This book is fucking fantastic!
I am so happy that is book existed for me to read it in Twenty-bi-teen and I feel truly blessed. I will scream about it until the end of time. It’s a beautiful love letter of a story about being comfortable in your skin, loving yourself and the beauty of true friendship. It’s about very diverse and queer and wonderful.
Darius the Great is Not Okay: *exists*
Me: 💓💗❤️💛❣️❣️💙💘💕💜🖤❤️💓💚💗💛💘💙💖💙💖💙💗💛💓❤️💚💛❤️💙💚💖💚❣️💙🖤💙💗💖❤️💕💚💙🖤💚💖💘❤️💕💖💗💚💓💚💛💘💕💙
❝It’s okay not to be okay.❞
Darius Kellner is fifteen years old and living his best life, not, like at all. The title says it all, he is not okay. Life as a biracial Iranian – American in Portland Oregon is not easy. Darius’s passion for tea and small nerdy connections over Star Trek with his father is what is keeps him going day after day. He doesn’t feel seen, or important or good enough, and his father isn’t helping matters whatsoever.
❝How could I be a tourist in my own past?❞
Darius is really struggling. He suffers from depression, for which he takes pills for, that help, but only to a certain degree. He is also overweight, something for which he receives a lot of criticism from his own father. He is not comfortable in his own skin. On top of all of that, he’s being bullied despite his school’s zero-tolerance policy.
But then Darius learns that his grandfather is dying from cancer I believe, and his parents decided that they should all go and visit him at least once more before he dies. Darius has never been to Iran. He doesn’t really speak Farsi, and he’s never actually met his Iranian family in person. He speaks better Klingon than anything else really.
❝No one had ever made me feel like it was okay to cry. Or bumped shoulders with me and made me smile.❞
When Darius arrives he just feels his foreignness is emphasized. He never felt like he belonged in America, but he doesn’t feel like he belongs in Iran either. He’s neither American enough, nor Persian enough. But then he meets Sohrab, a neighbor boy around his age, and he befriends Darius and everything changes.
❝Everyone wants you here. We have a saying in Farsi. It translates ‘your place was empty.’ We say it when we miss somebody.’ I sniffed. ‘Your place was empty before. But this is your family. You belong here.❞
Sohrab is wonderful. He does his best to make Darius feel good and like he belongs. He buys him an Iranian soccer jersey, which Darius adores, takes him out for faludeh and calls him Darioush, the traditional Persian version of his name.
❝They don’t know you, Darioush.’ Sohrab grabbed my shoulder. ‘I wish you could see yourself the way I see you.’ ‘I wish you could see yourself too.’ I swallowed. ‘You’re the only person who never wanted me to change.❞
Their friendship is so pure and wonderful and heartwarming. Even with the Khomeini dick jokes, they are amazing. While Darius has some feeling towards Sohrab, the book is a story of friendship, which is so utterly important in this genre. We need friendship, perhaps more than we need romantic relationships, and Darius and Sohrab give us all those warm fuzzy friend feels and more.
This book is completely character driven. If you don’t like character driven books, then I’d suggest you avoid this book. I personally love character driven books and I love these characters so it was really easy for me to fly through it. There isn’t that much of a plot, it’s mostly Darius trying to connect with his Persian roots and hanging out with Sohrab. You really get to see the development of the Darius and Sohrab’s character, which is super interesting, but it’s really about the characters, not what exactly they are doing.
❝The thing is, I never had a friend like Sohrab before. One who understood me without even trying. Who knew what it was like to be stuck on the outside because of one little thing that set you apart.❞
Darius’s family is Zoroastrian, which was such an interesting thing to explore. Darius’s parents and himself are agnostic but usually books about Iran future characters who are Muslim. And while we need stories like this about Muslim protagonists, I can’t name a single YA book that features Zoroastrian rep. I can name one adult book, aside from any of the Zoroastrian text that features Ahura Mazda, Ahriman, and or Zarathustra, but the protagonist was not a practicing Zoroastrian, nor did it talk much about it at all aside from mentioning khudai a few times. So, it was super interesting, especially visiting that Zoroastrian burial ground.
❝It’s Team Melli. Iran’s National team. From the World Cup.’ I pulled the jersey over my head—the collar of my Persian casual shirt stuck up underneath—but still, I felt like a real Iranian. Even though the cheetah’s head stretched over my stomach. ‘I love it,’ I said. ‘Thank you.’ It made me feel like I belonged.❞
Also, Sohrab and his family is Bahá’í which is even more incredible. I have never seen a book, fiction or non-fiction that discussed the Bahá’í faith. The Iranian government recognizes Christians and Zoroastrians as people of the book, which gives them rights to practice and not be given crap, but they do not recognize the Bahá’ís, which means it’s fairly common for Bahá’ís to end up in Evin Prison or other jails across the country merely for being Bahá’í as is Sohrab’s father. It’s a sad reality, and I am so glad that this book showcases that, however small.
Darius’s family is an interesting mix of characters. To be perfectly honest, Stephen Kellner sucks for the majority of the book. He’s very critical of Darius, especially in cases of Darius weight, which is not good for Darius’s already low self-esteem. Despite the shared weight of their depression, they really don’t have anything in common aside for their passion for Star Trek, but even that seems to lose traction between them. Darius doesn’t feel like his father cares about him and it’s the most heartbreaking thing. I am so glad that Darius and his father reconnect, especially because I saw there was a death in this book. I am glad that they end the novel with things heading for improvement and understanding. I came to appreciate him in the end I guess.
❝I wanted to know what our family’s stories were. I wanted to know the things Mom wouldn’t think to tell me. Things she knew but never said out loud, because they were a part of her. I wanted to know what made the Bahrami family special.❞
I really liked Babou, Mamou, Soheil, Jamsheed, Nazgol, and Shirin Kellner. Though I loved Laleh with my whole heart though. This is gonna sound super darn nerdy, but I was proud when I was listening to the audiobook that I could spell the name Laleh right. Laleh and Darius’s relationship was solid and pretty typical and authentic for their age difference and the fact they were siblings.
❝This goldfish only has one eyeball!’ It was true. The largest fish, a leviathan nearly the size of Laleh’s hand, only had its right eye. The left side of its head—face—(do fish have faces?)—was all smooth, unbroken orange scales … ‘I’m going to name him Ahab’ Since Laleh was in charge of feeding the fish, she had taken upon herself the solemn duty on naming them. ‘Captain Ahad had one leg, not one eye,’ I point out. ‘But its a good literary reference’ … ‘What about the others?’ ‘He’s Simon.’ She pointed to the smallest fish. ‘And he’s Garfunkel. And that’s Bob.❞
Babou didn’t quite understand mental health and that Darius couldn’t just get over it, but he still cared. And Mamou, what a wonderful woman.
❝I was one tiny pulsar in a swirling, luminous galaxy of Iranians, held together by the gravity of thousands of years of culture and heritage.❞
This book is #OwnVoices for the Persian representation, and for the depression. I am not entirely sure if Adib identifies as queer, but Darius is definitely queer, though he is closeted. The depression representation is amazing. It’s obviously very raw and authentic, and I felt so seen. I also high key appreciate the fact that he mentions that he also struggles with anxiety (even if it’s undiagnosed) because those two things are usually interconnected. I speak that as an anxious depressed person. This is the kind of representation of depression that makes me feel completely understood.
❝But the wall weren’t just inside of him. They were between us. I didn’t know how to breach them.❞
I love how we get to follow Darius around Yazd and other parts of Iran, like Persepolis, the palace of Darius’s namesake, Darius (or Darioush) the Great. We get to learn and explore much of Iran and it’s culture and people and food, and as a person who eats that stuff up, it’s perfect. I always love when books talk about food, and this book made me so hungry for some really good Persian food and a cup of really good tea. Faloodeh (a dessert made traditionally it is made from mixing rose syrup, vermicelli, sweet basil (sabza/takmaria) seeds with milk, often served with ice cream), Fesenjoon (lamb or chicken stew with ground walnuts and pomegranate paste), rosewater rosette pastry thing, Bastani (Iranian ice cream sugar, rose water, saffron, vanilla, and pistachios), you name it Darius, it sounded amazing. Also, Taarof-ing. I love it.
❝Taarof is a Farsi word that is difficult to translate. It’s a primary Social Cue for Iranians, encompassing hospitality and respect and politeness all in one. In theory, taarof means putting others before yourself. In practice, it means when someone comes to your house, you have to offer them food; but since the guest is supposed to taarof, they have to refuse; and then you, the host, must taarof back, insisting that is really no trouble at all, and that they absolutely must eat; and so on until one party gets too bewildered and finally gives in.❞
Adib is obviously a tea enthusiast, I mean it literally mentions that in his bio, but I love the role it plays. Its the one thing that Darius really connects to that is Persian. I love the talk about tea and what it means for Darius. He works at a tea shop, which I guess is basically the tea nerd equivalent of working at a bookstore or a library.
❝First off: My cousin Nazgol got her name from the Farsi word for flower. She was not a Ringwraith—a Nazgûl—and I was pretty sure she’d never read The Lord of the Rings, so it wasn’t like I could joke with her about it.❞
The writing is really good. It’s very accessible for readers of many ages and levels and it’s laced with pop culture and deadpan humour. For example, the tea machine thing is called Smaug the Terrible. Or Darius will reference to something in comparison to something in Star Trek. I don’t know anything about Star Trek, but I’ll admit this book piqued my interest. It was very easy and enjoyable to read. It carried the emotions and was just so good. Darius’s voice is so wonderful and was something I was able to relate to on an extreme level.
❝You really love Sohrab. Huh?’ ‘He’s the best friend I ever had.❞
The frank discussion of mental health also means a lot to me. Aside from Darius having depression, the whole thing with the medication and mental health in Iran adds another level. His grandparents don’t understand mental health in the same way. In a lot of ways, they see it as something really wrong with Darius and that is hard for him. So, like showing that is important.
❝Darioush what are you doing?’ ‘Taking my medicine.’ ‘Medicine?’ He picks up the pill bottle. ‘What is this for? Are you sick?’ ‘Depression,’ I say.❞
I also adore the chapter titles. My favourites include the following: There are Four Lights, The History of American-Iranian Relations, Ayatollah’s Turban, Persian Casual, The Borg of Herbs, My Cousin, the Ringwraith, Darius the Great, Soccer/Non-American Football, Sins of the Father, and Through a Wormhole.
I love the blurbs on this book, though two especially stand out:
“A love letter to anyone who has felt uncomfortable in their own skin and wondered where exactly they belonged. A big-hearted and marvelous debut.” – Jasmine Warga
“Darius the Great is not just okay—he’s wonderful. A story about learning who you are. Who you want to be. And how family will always be there. No matter how great the physical or emotional distance.” – Sara Farizan
“From its deadpan Star Trek humor to its brilliant examination of mental health. Darius the Great is Not Okay is a supernova of heart and hope that’s sure to become a classic.” – Nic Stone
I love these because honestly, I agree with all three of these blurbs. It emphasized the importance of friendship, mental heart and that this book is a love letter to those who are not comfortable in their skin. Those are all really important themes and I am so glad this book exists.
❝You okay, son?’ ‘Yeah, Dad,’ I said. I took a long, slow sip of my tea.
“I’m great.❞
Can we take a moment as well to acknowledge the acknowledgments? I might be the only teen who reads them, but I personally love reading acknowledgments. I usually revisit them multiple times during a reading of a book. I love the little jokes and gems authors sneak in. My own acknowledgments in my book are literally just a bunch of weird inside jokes and references that are hilarious even if you have no idea what the hell I am talking about. I love how Adib ends it with this message:
❝And finally, thank you to you, the reader. May your place never be empty.❞
While I was writing this review I came across May @ Forever & Everly’s review and I noticed a point she brought up about it emphasizes ‘that queer people don’t have to be in a relationship to be queer or queer enough’ which I find particularly interesting as a queer person who doesn’t feel like I am queer enough, even if I identify as bisexual. So I appreciate a queer book about friendship.
❝Maybe Sohrab and I really were destined to be friends. Sohrab’s smile brightens into a squint. ‘Friends?’ I smiled too. I was impossible not to. ‘Friends.❞
❝Darius the Great was a diplomat and a conqueror, I was just me.❞
Again, this book was just fucking amazing. Y’all should read it because it’s better than your fave. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Have you read Darius the Great is Not Okay yet? If so, what are your thoughts—I’d love to know, in the comments!
Petyr Baeish Books © 2019 by Tova Portmann-Bown
Petyr Baeish Books 
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