Guantánamo Diary

by Mohamedou Ould Slahi

Published 1 January 2015
THE SUNDAY TIMES and NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

'A kind of dark masterpiece' THE NEW YORK TIMES

'There has never been a book quite like this' NEW STATESMAN

In 2002, Mohamedou Ould Slahi was imprisoned at the detainee camp in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. In 2016, having never been charged with any crime, he has finally been approved for release.

In those fourteen years in captivity he suffered unspeakable abuse - sexual assault, threats to his family and months of sensory deprivation, his captors torturing him with the personal approval of the US Secretary of Defense - and he produced this remarkable document, the only first-hand account of a Guantanamo Detainee.

His diary is not merely a vivid record of a miscarriage of justice, but a deeply personal memoir - terrifying, darkly humorous, and surprisingly gracious. It is an extraordinary and moving story of human perseverance stretched to its limits, but never broken.