Suzanne Fisher Staples was a foreign news reporter for United Press International. She became the chief of UPI’s South Asia bureau and moved to India where she dealt with news from India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nepal. She later accepted a position working on a literacy programme with the US Agency for International Development in the Cholistan desert region of Pakistan. She made many friends and listened to the stories of the women. These accounts became the basis of our reading selection, Shabanu Daughter of the Wind.



Some of the major themes of our novel are:
- love
- prearranged marriage
- dowry
- tribal cultures
- women in a male dominated society
- independence

This video, directed by Ziad Khan, provides us with some great imagery for our novel with magnificent footage of the Pakistani desert.



This is a very interesting piece emphasizing the importance of weddings in Lahore, Pakistan. This is very far removed from the socioeconomic conditions of our novel, but it does give us great insight regarding the monetary aspect of matrimony. See the map to get an idea of the geographic relationship of Lahore to the setting of Shabanu, the Cholistan Desert. The Cholistan is 30 Km from Bahawalpur.