Theo Padnos is the author of Undercover Muslim, which explored everyday life among westerners as they studied in Yemen’s religious academies. He was held prisoner by the Syrian al Qaeda affiliate, Jebhat al Nusra, between 2012 and 2014. A documentary film about his experiences called Theo Who Lived was released in 2016 and was a New York Times Critic’s Pick.

“Lays bare the human condition at its extremes. There is depravity and resilience, rage and revelation, and, ultimately, a triumph of the human spirit…Padnos [is] a thoughtful witness of a nightmarish world…an acutely observed account that is deeply moving in places.” —New York Times Book Review "The best of the genre, profound, poetic, and sorrowful."—The Atlantic "[I]mmediate and a solid warning to enterprise journalists to give dangerous subjects plenty of distance." —Kirkus Reviews “Harrowing.” —Library Journal “Harrowing and absorbing…Padnos’ exquisitely painful accounts of his torture, and the tortures and deaths of his fellow inmates, both horrify and provoke a strange hope that it can’t get any worse….With emotional clarity, Padnos endows his captors with humanity, casting them as people struggling to survive in a world turned upside down, just as he is.”—BookPage “Although this is a book about captivity, suffering and savagery, it is also deeply moving, with shafts of enlightenment on every page. As a testament to the noblest qualities of the human spirit, it is thrilling.”—Lawrence Wright, author of The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11  “Theo Padnos was held, isolated, and tortured for almost two years by the al Qaeda affiliate in Syria. It would be hard for such a dramatic account to disappoint, and it doesn’t. But Padnos’s book is so much more. We see a narrator who is deeply human, vulnerable, and compelling. His thoughts are enough like our own that we easily imagine ourselves there, held captive by Islamists. His writing is rich and thoughtful and emotionally revelatory. This is a brilliant book.”—David Bradley, chairman, Atlantic Media

Theo Padnos is the author of Undercover Muslim, which explored everyday life among westerners as they studied in Yemen’s religious academies. He was held prisoner by the Syrian al Qaeda affiliate, Jebhat al Nusra, between 2012 and 2014. A documentary film about his experiences called Theo Who Lived was released in 2016 and was a New York Times Critic’s Pick.

“Lays bare the human condition at its extremes. There is depravity and resilience, rage and revelation, and, ultimately, a triumph of the human spirit…Padnos [is] a thoughtful witness of a nightmarish world…an acutely observed account that is deeply moving in places.” —New York Times Book Review "The best of the genre, profound, poetic, and sorrowful."—The Atlantic "[I]mmediate and a solid warning to enterprise journalists to give dangerous subjects plenty of distance." —Kirkus Reviews “Harrowing.” —Library Journal “Harrowing and absorbing…Padnos’ exquisitely painful accounts of his torture, and the tortures and deaths of his fellow inmates, both horrify and provoke a strange hope that it can’t get any worse….With emotional clarity, Padnos endows his captors with humanity, casting them as people struggling to survive in a world turned upside down, just as he is.”—BookPage “Although this is a book about captivity, suffering and savagery, it is also deeply moving, with shafts of enlightenment on every page. As a testament to the noblest qualities of the human spirit, it is thrilling.”—Lawrence Wright, author of The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11  “Theo Padnos was held, isolated, and tortured for almost two years by the al Qaeda affiliate in Syria. It would be hard for such a dramatic account to disappoint, and it doesn’t. But Padnos’s book is so much more. We see a narrator who is deeply human, vulnerable, and compelling. His thoughts are enough like our own that we easily imagine ourselves there, held captive by Islamists. His writing is rich and thoughtful and emotionally revelatory. This is a brilliant book.”—David Bradley, chairman, Atlantic Media

Theo Padnos is the author of Undercover Muslim, which explored everyday life among westerners as they studied in Yemen’s religious academies. He was held prisoner by the Syrian al Qaeda affiliate, Jebhat al Nusra, between 2012 and 2014. A documentary film about his experiences called Theo Who Lived was released in 2016 and was a New York Times Critic’s Pick.

“Lays bare the human condition at its extremes. There is depravity and resilience, rage and revelation, and, ultimately, a triumph of the human spirit…Padnos [is] a thoughtful witness of a nightmarish world…an acutely observed account that is deeply moving in places.” —New York Times Book Review "The best of the genre, profound, poetic, and sorrowful."—The Atlantic "[I]mmediate and a solid warning to enterprise journalists to give dangerous subjects plenty of distance." —Kirkus Reviews “Harrowing.” —Library Journal “Harrowing and absorbing…Padnos’ exquisitely painful accounts of his torture, and the tortures and deaths of his fellow inmates, both horrify and provoke a strange hope that it can’t get any worse….With emotional clarity, Padnos endows his captors with humanity, casting them as people struggling to survive in a world turned upside down, just as he is.”—BookPage “Although this is a book about captivity, suffering and savagery, it is also deeply moving, with shafts of enlightenment on every page. As a testament to the noblest qualities of the human spirit, it is thrilling.”—Lawrence Wright, author of The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11  “Theo Padnos was held, isolated, and tortured for almost two years by the al Qaeda affiliate in Syria. It would be hard for such a dramatic account to disappoint, and it doesn’t. But Padnos’s book is so much more. We see a narrator who is deeply human, vulnerable, and compelling. His thoughts are enough like our own that we easily imagine ourselves there, held captive by Islamists. His writing is rich and thoughtful and emotionally revelatory. This is a brilliant book.”—David Bradley, chairman, Atlantic Media