A beautiful 19-year-old named Gilda becomes the mistress of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, the last Shah of Iran. She dreams of becoming his wife. The narrator, in love with Gilda, follows clues about her death two years after the affair. During an assassination attempt on the Shah, he gets shot on the steps of the Marble Palace. As he puts it, "I took a bullet for my king up the ass and got a jester's seat, the best seat, to watch the fall of the Persian Empire."

Killing Gilda is infused with intrigue, but at its heart, it's a love story that follows the best traditions of classics like The Beauty and the Beast. We enter the rarified atmosphere of the court, the young woman's life, and the reasons for her death. We follow the characters through the Paris of Madame Claude, the Shah's ski resort at St. Moritz, and Doctor Pitanguy's plastic surgery clinic in Baden Baden.

Yahya Gharagozlou is joining us on the Busboys stage to dive deeper into this novel, and the stories and experiences that inspired it. Copies of the book will be available for purchase during and after the event, and Gharagozlou will be signing following the program.

This event is free and open to all. Please note that this event is in person and will not be livestreamed. We ask that guests RSVP in order to receive direct updates about the event from Busboys and Poets Books.

Hosted by Busboys and Poets @ 14th & V, 2021 14th St., NW, Washington, DC. Learn more here.