Rahima, the novel’s protagonist, is an Afghan girl from a small town some distance from Kabul. Rahima’s life is improved by her meager education and by the story of her great-great-grandmother, Shekiba. Her life is marked by tragedy, abuse, and resilience. She is the daughter of the opium-addicted soldier, Arif, and Raisa. Rahima grows up with four sisters. The middle child, Rahima, is the boldest. Rahima and her sisters are taken out of school by their father, who fears that they will cause him shame. At the suggestion of her aunt, Khala Shaima, Rahima becomes a bacha posh, a social role that allows her to act as a son for the family. She is known during this time as “Rahim.”

Rahima remains a bacha posh until age 13. She reaches puberty and starts to develop female secondary sex characteristics while still living as a boy. After Raisa discovers Rahima wrestling with her friend Abdullah, an argument causes Arif to act out of frustration and approach Abdul Khaliq to marry off the three eldest girls. Rahima is forced to marry Abdul Khaliq, a man who is older than her father. After many years of being accustomed to life as a boy, and with little advice from her mother to help, Rahima is ill-equipped for the demands of wifehood.