Overview
Micah Garen and Marie-Helene Carleton were journalists and filmmakers working in Iraq on a documentary with their Iraqi translator Amir Doshi. In the late summer of 2004, they began to wrap up their work, and Marie-Helene returned home while Micah remained for a final two weeks of filming. As Micah and Amir were filming in a Nasiriyah market, something went horribly wrong: Micah was unmasked as a foreigner and kidnapped by militants in southern Iraq.Home in New York, Marie-Helene awoke to a gut-wrenching phone call from Micah's mother with word of his abduction. She promised Micah's mother the impossible -- that together they would bring Micah back alive.
American Hostage is the remarkable memoir of Micah Garen's harrowing abduction and survival in captivity, as well as the heroic and successful struggle of Marie-Helene; along with family and friends to win Micah's and Amir's release from their captors. The world watched and waited as Micah's drama unfolded, but the authors, now safely home and engaged to be married, detail the dramatic untold story.
Synopsis
Micah Garen and Marie-Helene Carleton were journalists and filmmakers working in Iraq on a documentary with their Iraqi translator Amir Doshi. In the late summer of 2004, they began to wrap up their work, and Marie-Helene returned home while Micah remained for a final two weeks of filming. As Micah and Amir were filming in a Nasiriyah market, something went horribly wrong: Micah was unmasked as a foreigner and kidnapped by militants in southern Iraq.
Home in New York, Marie-Helene awoke to a gut-wrenching phone call from Micah's mother with word of his abduction. She promised Micah's mother the impossible -- that together they would bring Micah back alive.
American Hostage is the remarkable memoir of Micah Garen's harrowing abduction and survival in captivity, as well as the heroic and successful struggle of Marie-Helene; along with family and friends to win Micah's and Amir's release from their captors. The world watched and waited as Micah's drama unfolded, but the...
Publishers Weekly
Moving and suspenseful, this account of a journalist's ordeal as a captive in Iraq recounts the machinations behind a delicate hostage situation. Documentary filmmakers Garen and Carleton went to Iraq in 2003 to investigate reports of looting at archeological sites. Near the end of their project, Carleton returned to New York City, leaving Garen to complete the final stages of filming in the southern city of Nasiriyah. Everything seemed to be wrapping up smoothly until, two days before his scheduled return to America, Garen was identified as a foreigner in a crowded marketplace, and he and his Iraqi translator were kidnapped by a local Shi'ite group. Garen's first-person account of their time in captivity alternates chapters with Carleton's story of how friends and family rallied at home and abroad to jump-start a rescue effort, even before the FBI got on the case. Carleton details the effort's minute-by-minute reversals and its many risky decisions in crisp, straightforward prose that will soon have readers commiserating with her highs and lows. For his part, Garen recalls his fear, anger and confusion with clarity and immediacy, never demonizing his captors yet never condoning their acts. One of the book's great pleasures is the description of his friendship with his translator, Amir, an educated, secular Muslim. Even readers who followed the story in the newspapers will find much that is new since so many of the crucial negotiations happened off the front page. And with a romantic subplot humming through the tension, this story is made for the silver screen. Agent, Richard Abate. (Oct.) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.
Editorials
Publishers Weekly
Moving and suspenseful, this account of a journalist's ordeal as a captive in Iraq recounts the machinations behind a delicate hostage situation. Documentary filmmakers Garen and Carleton went to Iraq in 2003 to investigate reports of looting at archeological sites. Near the end of their project, Carleton returned to New York City, leaving Garen to complete the final stages of filming in the southern city of Nasiriyah. Everything seemed to be wrapping up smoothly until, two days before his scheduled return to America, Garen was identified as a foreigner in a crowded marketplace, and he and his Iraqi translator were kidnapped by a local Shi'ite group. Garen's first-person account of their time in captivity alternates chapters with Carleton's story of how friends and family rallied at home and abroad to jump-start a rescue effort, even before the FBI got on the case. Carleton details the effort's minute-by-minute reversals and its many risky decisions in crisp, straightforward prose that will soon have readers commiserating with her highs and lows. For his part, Garen recalls his fear, anger and confusion with clarity and immediacy, never demonizing his captors yet never condoning their acts. One of the book's great pleasures is the description of his friendship with his translator, Amir, an educated, secular Muslim. Even readers who followed the story in the newspapers will find much that is new since so many of the crucial negotiations happened off the front page. And with a romantic subplot humming through the tension, this story is made for the silver screen. Agent, Richard Abate. (Oct.) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.Library Journal
Kidnapped by militants in southern Iraq, where he and fianc e Carlton were making a film on the looting of important archaeological sites, Garen was threatened with death as the world watched and Carlton fought for his release. Here's their story; with a seven-city tour. Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.Kirkus Reviews
Gripping account of journalist Garen's kidnapping in southern Iraq and his fiancee's efforts in the U.S. to secure his release. In the summer of 2004, Garen and Carleton, professional as well as romantic partners, were gathering footage for a documentary about the looting of Iraqi historical sites. At the end of the project, Carleton left the country while Garen stayed behind to close up shop. The day before he was scheduled to leave, however, things went wrong. While in a local market, Garen made the mistake of opening his mouth, revealing himself as a foreigner. In moments, an angry mob coalesced and he and his translator were taken prisoner. Garen and Carleton tell the remarkable story of the men's kidnapping, their families' desperate efforts to have them freed and their astounding release just over a week later. Carleton and Garen take turns relating their experiences through the days of captivity. While Garen is hustled into a hut in a scrubby no-man's land, Carleton, in her last few moments of blissful unawareness, goes to the gym and checks her e-mail. Garen gives an hour-by-hour account of where he was taken, how he was treated, how he hoped to escape. Carleton, meanwhile, assembles a massive team of colleagues in Iraq, well-connected former classmates from the Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (there's a graduate degree that was worthwhile), and, soon enough, the FBI-all working feverishly to reach the sheiks who could then reach the kidnappers. The authors do an admirable job of leading the reader through the chaos of their days, and although the ending is a foregone conclusion, their story remains extraordinarily compelling. An incredible tale told withintensity by two very lucky people.—Starred Review