A review by larryerick
I Was Told to Come Alone: My Journey Behind the Lines of Jihad by Souad Mekhennet

5.0

Can you feel it? Can you see it in what I type? This book is resonating through me, pulsing through me. I am not a new student to the issues affecting the world surrounding the apparent clash -- Did I say clash? The author has this to say about the clash: "The world is not facing a clash of civilizations or cultures, but a clash between those who want to build bridges and those who would rather see the world in polarities, who are working hard to spread hatred and divide us." Say the word, "jihad", and the clash between Muslim and Western Judeo-Christian culture (and the equally intense clashes within those cultures) immediately fills our brains with imagery of conflict, war, hatred, and religious zealotry, overladen with powerful, often devastating economic weaponry. I reflected back on the many books I have read, both fiction and non-fiction, involving some aspect of these clashes, both modern and ancient. I counted 27 altogether. Some were intentionally broad in scope, such as a history of Islam and another one specifically of Afghanistan. Others were fictionalized or highly personal nonfiction accounts showing individuals trying to survive the storms around them. Many were middle east war related, both from a military and political perspective. Despite all that prior scholarship(?), this book easily does more than any other to pull it all together, and it does it in a personal, highly and consistently suspenseful, and extraordinarily lucid, balanced manner. It is very simply a memoir, but it is a memoir that reads much more like a John Grisham novel, albeit from a journalist's, rather than an attorney's, perspective. There is not a single chapter in the book without palpable suspense to one degree or another. I ask you: when was the last time you read a book that dealt so keenly with political policies and religious behavior that could repeatedly stimulate your base emotions? Needless to say, I'm terribly impressed with this book and with the individual that wrote it. Recommended without reservation.