I Never Said Goodbye: A Mother's Memoir of Love and Brutal Loss Inside Saddam's Regime

by Karen O'Brien (Author), Pauline Knowles-Samarraie (Author)

• Used

  Hardcover
  2007

  $3.29

  Yorkshire-born Pauline Samarraie set off for Baghdad in 1962, full of hopes and dreams, to start a new life with her Iraqi husband, Munem, a talented young scientist with a bright future. Though Pauline at first struggled to adapt to some of the cultural differences between her old and new life, and some members of Munem?s large family weren?t happy with his choice of bride and her Western ways, she made lots of friends, and remembers a carefree social whirl and happy times at home with her two young children, Mazin and Nada. But as the 60s made way for the 70s, the ruling Ba?ath party, and increasingly Saddam Hussein himself, had an ever more invidious role in the running of Iraq. Dissenters were not tolerated. Paranoia, fear and uncertainty started to creep into all of their lives. As deputy minister for oil, Munem?s career had taken him to the centre of government, and into close proximity with Saddam, who, as has been well documented, used arbitrary arrest and imprisonment, torture and summary execution to control his enemies as well as those close to him. Munem was ordered to witness executions of colleagues and friends, and Pauline saw him sink deeper and deeper into depression. Saddam called the house so frequently Munem came to dread the sound of the phone. ?Yes, sir. No, sir.? Pauline always knew when it was Saddam as no other words were necessary. The ruthless dictator cast a long, dark shadow over family life, and Pauline?s great Iraq adventure was to come to an unthinkable end.