Description:

From Booklist

Chosen by Glamour magazine as a Woman of the Year in 2008, Nujood of Yemen has become an international hero for her astonishingly brave resistance to child marriage. Sold off by her impoverished family at the age of 10, continually raped by her husband before she even reached puberty, Nujood found the courage to run away, and with the help of an activist lawyer, sympathetic judges, and the international press, she divorced her husband and returned home. Her clear, first-person narrative, translated from the French and written with Minoui, is spellbinding: the horror of her parents’ betrayal and her mother-in-law’s connivance, the “grown-ups” who send the child from classroom and toys to nightmare abuse. She never denies the poverty that drives her parents and oppresses her brothers, even as she reveals their cruelty. Unlike her passive mother, she is an activist, thrilled to return to school, determined to save others, including her little sister. True to the child’s viewpoint, the “grown-up” cruelty is devastating. Readers will find it incredible that such unbelievable abuse and such courageous resistance are happening now. --Hazel Rochman

Review

"A powerful new autobiography...It’s hard to imagine that there have been many younger divorcées — or braver ones — than a pint-size third grader named Nujood Ali."
—Nicholas Kristof, New York Times

"Her case has brought international exposure to the archaic practice of robbing girls of their youth." Four [out of four] Stars
—People magazine

"an international icon of tenacity and courage"
—New Yorker

"One of the greatest women I have ever seen . . . She set an example with her courage."
—Hillary Clinton

"This book took my breath away. It broke my heart but put it back together again with a renewed hope in the staggering power of the human spirit. What Nujood did to save her life was a miracle; that she did it as a ten-year-old child is, quite simply, astounding."
—Carolyn Jessop, author of Escape *and Triumph

"Nujood and all other girls like her who are traded like objects deserve to be heard. This important book gives them a voice and sheds light on an ugly secret that has destroyed the lives of children for centuries."
—Marina Nemat, author of Prisoner of Tehran*

"Simple and straightforward in its telling, this is an informative and thoroughly engaging narrative"
—Publishers Weekly