4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A memoir that remains vivid in mind & heart, November 5, 2004
This review is from: The First Evidence: A Memoir of Life in Iraq Under Saddam Hussein (Paperback)
Very interesting book, hard to put down before you reach the end. Although it started by describing the author's family docile life, and their standard of living as upper middle class, which made me think that I will read a book for a sophisticated and shallow writer, but it didn't take me more than a few pages to be completely absorbed by the shocking incidents that revealed the evil side of Sadam & Al Baath regime starting from 1970.
When she started talking about the serial Killer in Baghdad (Abu Tubar), I doubted her efficiency as a writer by inserting an unrelated incident. Again she proved me wrong, because this serial killer was only a fake mythology created by the government to hide its crimes and to create fear and panic among people to gain more control upon them.
Juman wrote her memoir with the view of an ordinary person, away from politics and Ideologies, which made it more effective not only in sympathizing with tragedies the Iraqi people faced, but in understanding the hard pressure they were under, along with the fear and humiliation that the author highlighted through unfolding surprises one after the other .
When the author's father, Engineer Makki, the deputy Prime Minister for The Ministry of Communication in Baghdad, discovered the secret of Abu Tubar, he was arrested by the secret police who already were angry with him because he refused to cooperate with them against the law or the benefit of the country.
Since the arrest, the family never had peace. During Lidya visit to her Husband Makki, the latter informed her that the secret government had implanted bugs all over their house, and advised her to be very careful and cautious. Later on they discovered that the full time Egyptian Housemaid was the government's secret agent.
The father remained in jail for three years and by the time he was released he became different person, his spirit was crushed and his health became weak.
Though they lived a very quite life keeping low profile, they couldn't achieve the luxury of peaceful life.
Soon their third son was arrested and the family went through another nightmare which did not vanish until all the family, the six children (three boys and three girls) were able to leave the country secretly one after the other and finally after a long time the parents.
But for the author Juman those nightmares are still vivid in her mind.
Reading this book which made my heart cry from pain and sadness, reminded me of the Chilean writer Isabel Allende `s believe, that writing about the daily life of women and children under the dictatorial regime, reveals a lot of facts that could not be found in historical or political or economical books, and the same with the famous and valuable book "I, Regoberta Menchu".
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