Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar: Summary and Study Guide

⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.

⚠️ This guide discusses the novel's central revelation in detail: Cyrus's mother, Roya, did not die on Iran Air Flight 655. She survived by swapping passports with her lover Leila and later became the artist Orkideh. If you want to experience the mystery as the book unfolds, read the novel before continuing.

Quick Facts

Short Summary

Cyrus Shams, a twenty-eight-year-old Iranian-American recovering alcoholic and aspiring writer, has been obsessed with martyrdom since his mother died on Iran Air Flight 655, shot down by the USS Vincennes in 1988. Living in Indiana with his best friend Zee, Cyrus plans a book about secular, pacifist martyrs—people who gave their lives to something larger than themselves. When he learns that a dying Iranian artist named Orkideh is staging a public death at the Brooklyn Museum, he travels to meet her, hoping to understand what makes a death meaningful. Over four days in Brooklyn, Cyrus confronts his addiction, his grief, and his desire to die. The novel interweaves his present-day story with the histories of his parents, his uncle Arash's wartime trauma, and the official documents surrounding the Flight 655 downing. When Orkideh dies, Cyrus discovers she was his mother, who survived the crash by swapping passports with her lover Leila.

Full Summary

Part One: Cyrus in Indiana

The novel opens in 2015 with Cyrus Shams lying on a mattress in his squalid Indiana bedroom, which smells of urine and Febreze. He has spent twenty-seven years without hearing from God and asks for a sign: if the single light bulb above him flickers, he will sell his possessions and buy a camel to ride to Medina or Gethsemane. The bulb flickers briefly, then returns to normal. Cyrus reviews the drugs he consumed that day—alcohol, marijuana, cigarettes, Klonopin, Adderall, and Neurontin—and drinks from an Old Crow whiskey bottle, asking God to repeat the sign. The light does not flicker again.

Two years later, Cyrus works as a paid medical actor at Keady University Hospital, simulating dying patients and their relatives for medical students. His roommate Zee warns him the work may be unhealthy. During one performance, Cyrus breaks character to describe his own past suicidal episode, when he nearly set himself on fire with Everclear before abandoning the plan. He leaves the hospital feeling ashamed.

Cyrus's backstory emerges through interleaved chapters. His childhood was marked by sleep terrors that gave way to chronic insomnia. His father Ali worked at a chicken farm in Fort Wayne, Indiana, waking at 4:30 a.m. for extra pay. Ali bought a singing fish decoration they both loved. Each Nowruz they called Uncle Arash, a war veteran who had posed as an angel on the battlefield and now suffered severe mental illness. Ali drank gin nightly to sleep. Cyrus left for Keady University, where he began drinking and using drugs. Ali died of a stroke during Cyrus's sophomore year. Cyrus grieved by drinking more, obtaining prescriptions, and trading drugs. After years, he got sober, but his insomnia worsened.

Part Two: The Martyrdom Project

Cyrus tells his friends Zee and Sad James about his new writing project on martyrdom. He explains his fascination with martyrs, his mother's meaningless death on a downed flight, and his uncle's trauma from the Iran-Iraq War. Sad James shows them a tweet about an art exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum: a dying Iranian artist named Orkideh will live at the museum and speak with visitors until she dies. Cyrus recognizes her name as Farsi for orchid. Zee urges Cyrus to go meet her, arguing this is a sign. Cyrus agrees to go that weekend.

The novel interweaves the story of Roya Shams (Cyrus's mother) in Tehran in 1987. Roya, dissatisfied with her life and needing solitude, reluctantly hosts Leila, her husband's friend's new wife, while the men take an annual camping trip. Leila reveals an outgoing and irreverent personality. Their friendship deepens into a passionate love affair, culminating in a first kiss in a bazaar alley and a night of dancing and intimacy.

The novel also periodically reproduces official documents: U.S. Navy investigation reports by Rear Admiral William M. Fogarty, which state that the downing of the Iranian commercial airliner was not an intentional act by the Vincennes, and New York Times articles reporting the incident and its aftermath. These documents frame the historical tragedy that shapes Cyrus's family.

Part Three: Brooklyn and Orkideh

Cyrus travels to Brooklyn with Zee. At the Brooklyn Museum, he meets Orkideh, an artist dying of terminal cancer who has stopped treatment and is spending her final days in a gallery exhibition called