I picked up my copy at Iris' suggestion on January 24th, 2026, at Booksmith in Haight-Ashbury

It's 10:23pm now, on January 25th.

I finished reading Martyr! a couple hours ago and I'm compelled to jot down lingering first impressions. Lyrical language, wrought forth by characters nuanced in their flaws and desires. I wonder how this book's themes will take hold in my mind, laying roots invisible to the surface.

Martyr is not a book I'd have chosen of my own accord. And yet, I found myself unable to put it down. The protagonist, Cyrus Shams, is not a likable guy. Generally an asshole, he bums around while waxing poetic about the poems he's yet to write. Cyrus is no stranger to tragedy. Senseless violence, actuarial rounding errors — death itself is a persistent character in this read.

Sobriety vs. the numbness offered by intoxication: alcohol, drugs, sex. Characters self-medicate and self-soothe. What does it mean to live when all you look forward to is your next fix? In what ways are we looking for our next fix? The next promotion, next project, next milestone... We live out the vast majority of our lives in the liminal in-between. How might we cultivate lives where the in-between remains meaningful, in both joy and sorrow, excitement and mundanity?

Repeated bed-wetting. Conscious repression, subconscious relief. Characters stifle themselves while awake. Dreams become sandboxes to warp reality. Tear-down, build-up. Define your own constraints.

The artist's perspective. Poet, painter, experiencer, creator. We feel, we poke and prod at ourselves, observing the crevices of our emotions. We capture those emotions in our handiwork.

• Cyrus grapples with his identity: Tehran-born, Indiana-raised
• Intersectionality: queerness, the "otherness" of his Persian background, the impoverished circumstances he's raised in
• Religion and its lived interpretations
• Martyrdom and meaning