Pakistani media spitting blood on book: Fatima

Fatima Bhutto, whose book on the Bhutto dynasty was released recently, says Pakistani media is "spitting blood" over the tome.

Some Pakistani critics have dismissed Fatima's book "Songs of Blood and Sword" as being one-sided and full of glaring half-truths. "Pakistani media is spitting blood over it - which is to be expected..." Fatima, tweeted to a Pakistani woman politician who claimed to be reading her book.

"The good news is that they still hate me in Pakistan!" reads another tweet by Fatima, who has been actively promoting her book on the social networking website Twitter.

However, Fatima is elated that her book is doing well in India. "Thank you! Very strange that I'm slated at home but feted in India...Politics, I tell you," she tweeted recently.

Fatima also celebrates the fact that her book is selling more than Jaswant Singh's book on Pakistan's founder Muhammad Ali Jinnah.

However, Fatima's memoirs are yet to beat former President Pervez Musharraf's memoirs "In The Line Of Fire".

In one of her tweets, Fatima thanks "India" for making her book No 1. "Best news of all? 'Songs of Blood and Sword' is the number 1 non-fiction book in India. Thank you India...."

Fatima's portrayal of her late aunt, former premier Benazir Bhutto, in the book has not gone down well with many. "As a work of journalism, which is what the book purports to be, 'Songs of Blood and Sword' is about as useful as 'Mein Kampf'.

"Fatima Bhutto prefers lyricism over facts, yes-men over dissenting opinions and vendettas over reconciliation," read a report in a local daily.

Fatima is also being criticised for succumbing to family tales of greatness of her late grandfather Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. "Bhutto's hero-worship of her grandfather is matched only by the venom she directs at her aunt Benazir Bhutto. By now everyone is wearily familiar with Fatima Bhutto's accusation that Benazir was responsible for her father Murtaza’s murder," the newspaper report said.

"But she adds a new charge to Benazir's rap sheet: the curious death of Shahnawaz Bhutto. All she offers by way of evidence is an interview she had with a lawyer, Jacques Verges, who looked into the case," the report added.

Leading Pakistani political commentator and columnist Nadeem F Paracha pooh-poohed Fatima's memoirs and pointed out some "glaring half-truths".

"As expected, the book is a passionate argument against whatever her controversial father (Murtaza Bhutto) had been accused of, and, of course, this being Fatima Bhutto, she makes sure to every now and then ridicule her aunt, Benazir Bhutto, who, as a character in the book, is always lurking somewhere behind, manipulating, sulking and having a ‘split personality’," Paracha wrote in a piece titled "Dad who would be king".

Fatima's book has been shortlisted for the Big Red Read prize in Britain.