About the Book: The Cry of the Nightingale
Growing up in small-town Punjab in Pakistan, all Rabiya ever wanted was to read
her books and then help others like her read and learn by becoming a teacher.
But her dreams are shattered when her father—her supporter and confidant—passes
away and her elder brother Faruk—the new man of the house—stops her education
and marries her off to an older man, Kareem, from Lahore. Kareem is an orthodox,
loveless man with many rules, and Rabiya seeks release in her old college novels
and by sneaking off to the Punjab Public Library with her neighbour Nazo, with
whom