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4.76 AVERAGE
4.76 AVERAGE
This is an important read, there’s no doubt about it. Adayfi opens the door to a place that few Americans have seen and forces you to look at the consequences of American world domination. I could not finish the book due to the graphic descriptions of violence and torture he endured as a prisoner at Guantanamo Bay. One day, I would like to return to this book and read it in it’s entirety.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Confinement, Torture, Blood, Islamophobia
Moderate: Medical content, Injury/Injury detail
challenging
dark
emotional
medium-paced
This should be required reading. A nightmarish look into the landscape of Guantanamo and how one prisoner made it out.
challenging
dark
informative
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
dark
emotional
hopeful
medium-paced
dark
emotional
sad
slow-paced
challenging
dark
emotional
dark
emotional
inspiring
fast-paced
An eye-opening, powerful, moving, terrible, incredible book. I think it's the best book I will read all year. Citizens of the United States owe it to Mansoor Adayfi to read this book. We owe him that much. We should know what our military has done. We should be against our military, and the horrific atrocities it has committed, the decades of torture of innocent men.
challenging
emotional
sad
medium-paced
It's hard to rate memoirs, but this one was easy. There really is no other rating to give other than 5 stars.
This book recounts Mansoor Adayfi's journey from being a bright-eyed young boy about to go to the college of his dreams, to being suddenly kidnapped by a foreign power and imprisoned for no good reason, and tortured for 14 entire years at the shame of an American prison Guantánamo Bay Detention Camp. He was finally released in 2016 to Serbia, and they didn't have the decency to release him as a free man:
"I was shipped out of Guantánamo in the same way I was shipped in: against my will, gagged, blindfolded, hooded, earmuffed, and shackled. I was loaded into the cold body of a military transport plane, chained to my chair, and flown halfway around the world to a scary place I didn't know. But that's another story, for another time." (I'm hoping this alludes to an additional book he'll be writing about his life outside of Guantánamo.)
This is a book about one of the many stains of shame that America has borne in its less than 300 years in existence. It is a book about hate and evil and fear and disgust and racism and Islamophobia, and basically how horrible human beings can be (and are) to each other. It is also a book about love and resistance and respect and acceptance, and basically how good human beings can be with each other. I want to read more things written by these detainees now!
The most shameful thing is that Guantánamo Bay is STILL (in 2023!!) open, STILL holding detainees. One day, IF it ever closes, I hope it turns into a museum where America can go to in some fashion live the lives of the prisoners held there, and to remember that America is a "great" country in the very worst of ways. As well as the very best of ways. And one day I will go to visit the Guantánamo Bay Memorial Museum in Cuba once it opens. At least, if the detention camp actually closes before my lifetime is up (I was born in the 1990s, so who knows, maybe it won't close down before the 2080s...)
In his acknowledgments, Adayfi says, "And finally, to 441, who fought so hard for my survival."
441 is his prisoner number. I am also grateful to number 441, who fought all those years in order to survive and show its shame to America.
This book recounts Mansoor Adayfi's journey from being a bright-eyed young boy about to go to the college of his dreams, to being suddenly kidnapped by a foreign power and imprisoned for no good reason, and tortured for 14 entire years at the shame of an American prison Guantánamo Bay Detention Camp. He was finally released in 2016 to Serbia, and they didn't have the decency to release him as a free man:
"I was shipped out of Guantánamo in the same way I was shipped in: against my will, gagged, blindfolded, hooded, earmuffed, and shackled. I was loaded into the cold body of a military transport plane, chained to my chair, and flown halfway around the world to a scary place I didn't know. But that's another story, for another time." (I'm hoping this alludes to an additional book he'll be writing about his life outside of Guantánamo.)
This is a book about one of the many stains of shame that America has borne in its less than 300 years in existence. It is a book about hate and evil and fear and disgust and racism and Islamophobia, and basically how horrible human beings can be (and are) to each other. It is also a book about love and resistance and respect and acceptance, and basically how good human beings can be with each other. I want to read more things written by these detainees now!
The most shameful thing is that Guantánamo Bay is STILL (in 2023!!) open, STILL holding detainees. One day, IF it ever closes, I hope it turns into a museum where America can go to in some fashion live the lives of the prisoners held there, and to remember that America is a "great" country in the very worst of ways. As well as the very best of ways. And one day I will go to visit the Guantánamo Bay Memorial Museum in Cuba once it opens. At least, if the detention camp actually closes before my lifetime is up (I was born in the 1990s, so who knows, maybe it won't close down before the 2080s...)
In his acknowledgments, Adayfi says, "And finally, to 441, who fought so hard for my survival."
441 is his prisoner number. I am also grateful to number 441, who fought all those years in order to survive and show its shame to America.
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
inspiring
sad
fast-paced