One of the Ten Best Books of 2009

as chosen by Dwight Garner of The New York Times

“[Saïd Sayrafiezadeh] is a name you may want to remember… [He writes] with extraordinary power and restraint.”

"When Skateboards Will Be Free is a brave, honest and elegant book. It felt

like the story was being whispered in my ear. I haven’t read a memoir in quite a while that has so skillfully made sense of an American childhood."

    — Colum McCann, author of Let the Great World Spin,
        winner of the 2009 National Book Award

The New Yorker

Saïd Sayrafiezadeh’s short story, “Appetite,” in the March 1, 2010 issue.

Things were not going as I hoped. My sole purpose for interrupting my manager at this late hour on this Monday night was to inquire, respectfully about an increase in my wage. But the conversation had somehow reversed itself, and now here I was standing awkwardly in the doorway of the restaurant office having to defend my very competency at my job…