Not Without My Son is the memoir of Iranian-born Dr. Mariam Naseem, a Jewish woman who must flee for her safety from the new theocracy of Iran. Together with her infant son and the husband who was chosen for her, she arrives in the United States to face unexpected challenges. The greatest obstacle of all, though, is the sudden change in her son, whose studies at a prestigious Ivy League school are cut short by illness. When it seems that no one can or will offer a helping hand, Naseem discovers that her own inner strength will help her get by.
The true story of Betty Mahmoody's escape from Iran with her daughter after her Iranian husband attempted to turn a two-week vacation into a permanent relocation and a life of subservience for Betty and her daughter.
The daughter at the center of the international bestseller Not Without My Daughter completes her story: escaping from Iran, growing up in fear, battling deadly disease, and learning to forgive. Two decades ago, millions of readers worldwide thrilled to the story told in the international bestseller Not Without My Daughter—subsequently made into a film starring Sally Field—that told of an American mother and her six-year-old child’s daring escape from an abusive and tyrannical Iranian husband and father. Now the daughter returns to tell the whole story, not only of that imprisonment and escape but of life after fleeing Tehran: living in fear of re-abduction, enduring recurring nightmares and panic attacks, attending school under a false name, battling 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. Taking readers from Michigan to Iran and from Ankara, Turkey, to Paris, France, My Name Is Mahtob depicts the profound resilience of a wounded soul healed by faith in God’s goodness and in his care and love. And Mahmoody reveals the secret of how she liberated herself from a life of fear, learning to forgive the father who had shattered her life and discovering joy and peace that comes from doing so.
A true story of how living in poverty, having a dysfunctional family, and living in Syria with domestic abuse should have destroyed me, but God pulled me out of it all by giving me a will to never give up and to keep fighting for my son and my right to live free through Jesus.
SHOWCASE "Rebecca Winters is a master storyteller whose characters touch your heart." —Bonnie K. Winn TESSA MARSDEN. Her marriage was a mistake; her son, Scotty, was not. She loves her child with all her heart and soul. She's tried hard to make the marriage work, but this is a marriage that can't be saved. She knows now that she has to get out—before it completely destroys her and her husband, Grant. But when she files for divorce, Grant—for reasons of his own, reasons she doesn't understand—demands full custody of Scotty. Tessa can't live with that. She can't live without her child. ALEX SOMMERFIELD. He's the lawyer handling her divorce. He defies all the rules by falling love with his client. But he's determined not to put her custody case or her happiness at risk…. "Rebecca Winters is a sterling storyteller whose heroes and heroines make you believe all the warm, wonderful things love can be." —Betina Lindsey, author of The Swan Bride trilogy
Children are "a blessing" from God "Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you; before you were born, I dedicated you" (Jeremiah 1:5). Margaret feels overwhelmed with all that is happening in her life: loosing her home, trying her best to nurture a good relationship with her children while guiding them on the right path of holiness, dealing with her husbands new job of 7 days a week and 24 hours a day, the economic issue the United States is undergoing, and now, a sudden secession from the Federated States of Micronesia and the Compact of Free Association with the United States proposed by her home states elected government officials. If the secession were to go through, it is very likely Margaret will be deported from the United States soil. If that were to happen, what about her U.S citizen young children and her American husband of 21 years? Margaret feels her husband can manage without her, but she must fight to be with her children at all cost. "These are my children, flesh of my flesh, bone of my bones, and blood of my blood; they are my responsibility, my love and my life. My government can either take me to jail or take my life, but it can never take me away from my children" Margaret cried herself to sleep while petitioning God to intervene recalling a dream she had had some years ago where she saw the future 1st African American President of the United States, U.S President Barak Obama, and where he politically stands on the prolife issue, particularly abortion. When we are talking about abortion, we are talking about children and how much they mean to us. Children are created by God for a reason. From her dream, Margaret is convinced, God calls certain individuals into the political and government arena to serve, care for and protect human life as their primary duty. On the other hand, the peoples duty is to keep their elected government leaders in their prayers, for their task can be overwhelming!
Not My Son, Not My Daughter was birthed from years of experience watching children suffer due to the lack of knowledge from their parents or caregivers. However, this even goes deeper than that, not only has the children suffer from lack of parental care, but from the systems put in place, such as Child Protective Service and the Juvenile Justice System. It takes a lot of courage to speak out and ask for help, to tell someone your body has been violated in the most unimaginable way. Once you muster up that courage to tell the trusted adult - a parent or caregiver, relative, teacher, either social work or probation officer - three things must happen to help your healing journey. Those three things are: First, they have to believe you; second, you need to be safe from the person or the environment; and lastly, there has to be continual protection. If these three things do not happen, we cripple our courageous boy or girl from completely healing. Sometimes, the most unfortunate things happen and someone you trust molests your child. You cannot change what happened to the child. Nevertheless, you can certainly believe, keep them safe, and protect them from a future occurrence. Read this book to see how you can turn a tragedy into a treasure.
"I have never before read anything except Nabokov’s Speak, Memory that so relentlessly and shrewdly exhausted the kindness and cruelty of recollection’s shaping devices." —Geoffrey Wolff Born in Czechoslovakia, Mark Slouka’s parents survived the Nazis only to have to escape the Communist purges after the war. Smuggled out of their own country, the newlyweds joined a tide of refugees moving from Innsbruck to Sydney to New York, dragging with them a history of blood and betrayal that their son would be born into. From World War I to the present, Slouka pieces together a remarkable story of refugees and war, displacement and denial—admitting into evidence memories, dreams, stories, the lies we inherit, and the lies we tell—in an attempt to reach his mother, the enigmatic figure at the center of the labyrinth. Her story, the revelation of her life-long burden and the forty-year love affair that might have saved her, shows the way out of the maze.
John Williams is a stand-up comedian. He is also a single father and full-time carer for his son, who has autism and cerebral palsy. This is their incredible story.
