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Zana Muhsen, born and bred in Birmingham, is of Yemeni origin. When her father told her she was to spend a holiday with relatives in North Yemen, she jumped at the chance. Aged 15 and 13 respectively, Zana and her sister discovered that they had been literally sold into marriage, and that on their arrival they were virtually prisoners. They had to adapt to a completely alien way of life, with no running water, dung-plastered walls, frequent beatings, and the ordeal of childbirth on bare floors with only old women in attendance. After eight years of misery and humiliation Zana succeeded in escaping, but her sister is still there, and it seems likely that she will now never leave the country where she has spent more than half her life. This is an updated edition of Zana's account of her experiences.
Ten years previously Zana Muhsen escaped from the life of slavery in the Yemen into which her father had sold her as a child bride, leaving behind her baby son, her sister Nadia, and Nadia's two small children. As she described so powerfully in her internationally bestselling book SOLD, Zana made a solemn vow to Nadia that she would do everything she possibly could to obtain their freedom as well. A PROMISE TO NADIA tells the extraordinary story of those ten years; of the family's lone campaign against the Yemeni authorities; of the refusal of their own government in London to help; and of the despair that forced them into a desperate deal with an unofficial military-style organisation specialising in the recovery of abducted children.
Zana Muhsen, born and bred in Birmingham, is of Yemeni origin. When her father told her she was to spend a holiday with relatives in North Yemen, she jumped at the chance. Aged 15 and 13 respectively, Zana and her sister discovered that they had been literally sold into marriage, and that on their arrival they were virtually prisoners. They had to adapt to a completely alien way of life, with no running water, dung-plastered walls, frequent beatings, and the ordeal of childbirth on bare floors with only old women in attendance. After eight years of misery and humiliation Zana succeeded in escaping, but her sister is still there, and it seems likely that she will now never leave the country where she has spent more than half her life. This is an updated edition of Zana's account of her experiences.
Providing an account of her battle with an abusive man and with bureaucracy, this is the story of a woman's fight against a violent and tyrannical relationship, and her struggle to reclaim her two daughters, sold into marriage in the Yemen. Mirian Kamouhi - half Pakistani, half English - met Muthana Muhsen in Birmingham in 1960, when she was 17. They never married, but had seven children, the two eldest of whom were sent to Yemen in 1966 for a holiday . Their mother, fighting ill-health and with little money, would not meet them again until they were adults.
Jacky was twenty-three when she arrived in Egypt for a holiday with her boyfriend, Dave. Little did she know that an innocent holiday would result in a horror beyond her imagination. Separated from Dave in a bustling street, Jacky fell and twisted her ankle, only to be swept up by a handsome, chivalrous Egyptian called Omar. It was love at first sight. Jacky spent those ten days living with the family - sharing a bed with Omar's sister - irresistibly attracted to Omar. Swept away by her infatuation she married him and converted to Islam before returning to England to her parents. Returning to Cairo against her parents' advice but full of hopes and plans, Jacky's dream turned into a nightmare...
Soraya M.’s husband, Ghorban-Ali, couldn’t afford to marry another woman. Rather than returning Soraya’s dowry, as custom required before taking a second wife, he plotted with four friends and a counterfeit mullah to dispose of her. Together, they accused Soraya of adultery. Her only crime was cooking for a friend’s widowed husband. Exhausted by a lifetime of abuse and hardship, Soraya said nothing, and the makeshift tribunal took her silence as a confession of guilt. They sentenced her to death by stoning: a punishment prohibited by Islam but widely practiced. Day by day—sometimes minute by minute—Sahebjam deftly recounts these horrendous events, tracing Soraya’s life with searing immediacy, from her arranged marriage and the births of her children to her husband’s increasing cruelty and her horrifying execution, where, by tradition, her father, husband, and sons hurled the first stones. A stark look at the intersection between culture and justice, this is one woman’s story, but it stands for the stories of thousands of women who suffered—and continue to suffer—the same fate. It is a story that must be told.
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In 1998, Sarbjit Athwal was called by her husband to attend a family meeting. It looked like just another family gathering. An attractive house in west London, a large dining room, two brothers, their mother, one wife. But the subject they were discussing was anything but ordinary. At the head of the group sat the elderly mother. She stared proudly around, smiling at her children, then raised her hand for silence. ‘It’s decided then,’ the old lady announced. ‘We have to get rid of her.’ ‘Her’ was Surjit Athwal, Sarbjit’s sister-in-law. Within three weeks of that meeting, Surjit was dead: lured from London to India, drugged, strangled, and her body dumped in the Ravi River, ne...
Ghostwriting is a thriving, secretive industry. As a ghostwriter you can create best-selling books for film stars, footballers, pop singers, presidents, business tycoons, gangsters, gurus, spies, mercenaries, courtesans, four-star generals, royals and anyone else with an interesting story to tell. This book reveals all the essential secrets of how to turn ghostwriting into a successful and lucrative career. Andrew Crofts has ghosted more than forty books, many of them international bestsellers, including Sold by Zana Muhsen (nearly 4 million copies sold), The Kid by Kevin Lewis, Heroine of the Desert by Donya Al-Nahi, Kathy and Me by Gillian Taylforth and Crocodile Shoes by Jimmy Nail.
Two decades ago, Not Without My Daughter (a global phenomenon made into a film starring Sally Field) told of the daring escape of an American mother and her six-year-old child from an abusive and fanatical Iranian husband and father. Now the daughter tells the whole story, not only of her imprisonment and escape but of life after fleeing Iran: living in fear of re-abduction, battling recurring nightmares and panic attacks, taking on an assumed name, surviving life-threatening illness-all under the menacing shadow of her father. This is the story of an extraordinary young woman's triumph over life-crushing trauma to build a life of peace and forgiveness. Moving from Michigan to Tehran, from Ankara to Paris, Mahtob reveals the profound resilience of a wounded soul healed by her faith in God's goodness and his care and love for her