... a starkly human dispatch from the messy and often unheard receiving end of the war on terror ... After numerous chapters of such descriptions, the violence begins to grate, but Adayfi provides glimmers of light ... Throughout Guantánamo’s history, the knowledge the world has about the facility and what has happened there is only what has emerged from the long struggle between a government drastically restricting information on national security grounds and efforts by lawyers, journalists and human rights groups to pry out as much detail as possible. Adayfi’s voice adds to that knowledge because it comes firsthand from inside the walls. But I often wondered how much I could trust his version of events.
The author’s harrowing, 15-year ordeal is one that is ultimately of resilience and deep faith ... This survivor spares no details in relaying his travails, but he also provides beauty, in describing the little things that gave him hope, like animals or the sounds of the sea. Mansoor’s plight is unfathomable, but his strength is enviable. His powerful story is a must read in every way.
Much of this straightforward, grief-stricken chronicle is an alternately solemn and gruesome account of the horrendous daily treatment of the prisoners ... powerful ... An important record of prisoner mistreatment as a national reckoning over Guantánamo continues to loom.
... searing ... The savagery of his treatment is harrowing, and the revelation that no charges were brought against him at the end of his long captivity is deeply disturbing. Even still, Adayfi manages to focus on the beauty and hope that came from his darkest times ... This poignant testament strikes a devastating chord.
