Thanks for taking the time to visit my Just Giving page and I hope you will encourage my Reading Marathon and help me raise funds for fearless and brave women imprisoned in Iran.

I am challenging myself with reading Four books every week which is a big test even for my reading habits.

I've loved books ever since I can remember.   My parents told me that when I was about three and they read me stories, I started watching their lips to make sure they weren't leaving anything out.  

I never looked back. Now I'm overjoyed to find that I can raise money for my favourite charity by doing something that I love to do.

When reading books I think of so many women and girls that have fight for an education, struggle for the right to read or to write, and they succeed doing so with unimaginable spirit. 
When I read about Golrokh Iraee, I was hurt deeply and
also inspired by her courage. As someone who is inspired by books I felt I want to be a voice for women like her. She was an accountant in Tehran, imprisoned only for writing an unpublished story about stoning women that was confiscated during a raid on her home. Her brave stance during six years touched me and I want to share her dream for Iranian women freely expressing themselves, and exploring their passion of writing, reading, sports, music and professions. I have met so many inspiring Iranian women and have read about many of them too.  This is the reason for my reading marathon, to be their voice and to tell of their dreams.

This charity ILA, works for people in Iran, which has one of the world's worst human rights records.   It is the world's top executioner of women and minors, and more women commit suicide there than in any other country.  Its prison conditions were a danger to life even before the pandemic, and women can be sent to them for showing too much of their hair, like Monireh Arabshahi and her daughter Yasmana, both sentenced to sixteen years. Monireh needs a thyroid operation and is not allowed to have it.

More examples:  Maryam Akbari Monfared was arrested when her daughter was three years old.   When she needed an operation at the age of eleven, her mother was not allowed to be with her.  Atena Daemi, a human rights activist, was sentenced to seven years' imprisonment and torture in 1988, then another five years and 74 lashes for attending to the families of victims of execution.   

I have read the memoirs of Azam Hadj Heydari, who was tortured in prison by her brother, and Hengameh Haj Hassan, one of whose cellmates was a sixteen-year-old girl subject to severe epileptic fits, repeatedly beaten till she was at death's door for reading love stories.

In order to raise money to help them and the tens of thousands of others like them, I have committed myself to reading four books a week for the next five weeks, starting today . (I'll keep a list of them). 

Please help and encourage me in my challenge and support my reading marathon by contributing and help these courageous women. I am grateful for every bit of support.

Will you contribute?