On Jan. 23, the day after his book came out, 21-year-old Ali Jane received a surprise phone call from his mother back home in Afghanistan, telling him she and his two older sisters were safe in Kabul.
Jane's friend, a worker at the Japan International Cooperation Agency in Kabul, had managed to find her.
The brief call was the first time he had heard from his mother since he fled his homeland in February 2001 when his father was hauled away by the Taliban militia, never to be heard from again.