On why many of her characters are initially unaware of their parents' imprisonment
"My parents always spoke about their past in prison, but I wrote those stories in the novel, of people not knowing, because a lot of people in Iran don't know of what happened in 1988. Afterwards it was just, you know, it was just like the bodies — it was just buried, like that. And no one ever spoke about it. So in a way, those children in the book that don't know symbolize that part of the society that didn't know what was going on just a few kilometers from the city."
On whether she has spent much time in Iran
"I used to go back very often in all these years that I've been away. And sometimes it's really interesting how, as an, almost an outsider, you know, you go and you observe with a different sort of attention. And everything, you know, stuck in my mind. ... But now I don't know. We'll see what happens after the book."
On whether she's concerned about how her book will be received in Iran
"Yes, you know, by the government. Even though these executions [weren't] exactly a secret, I'm sure they don't want these sort of things to be, you know, to be known — not on such levels. And you know, dictatorships work in this way: You don't even know what you're afraid of, what you're worried about, what you risk. My mom says, 'Well, you know, you should just wait a little bit and see what happens.' "
Read an excerpt of Children of the Jacaranda Tree