Christina Lamb – författare

In the face of Taliban oppression, one girl's unwavering defiance sparked a worldwide movement. Shot in the head for daring to seek an education, Malala Yousafzai defied all odds, emerging stronger than ever. From a valley in Pakistan to the global stage, she became a beacon of peaceful resistance and the youngest Nobel laureate. I Am Malala is an extraordinary story of resilience, a family shattered by terrorism and the power of one voice to inspire change in the world.'Moving and illuminating' OBSERVER'Inspirational and powerful' GRAZIA'Astonishing' SPECTATOR'A tale of immense courage and conviction' THE INDEPENDENT'One finishes the book full of admiration' SUNDAY TIMES'Malala is a true inspiration' THE SUN'Piercingly wise' INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY

Ten years ago, Christina Lamb reported on the war the Afghan people were fighting against the Soviet Union. Now, back in Afghanistan, she has written an extraordinary memoir of her love affair with the country and its people.Long haunted by her experiences in Afghanistan, Lamb returned there after last year's attack on the World Trade Centre to find out what had become of the people and places that had marked her life as a young graduate.This time seeing the land through the eyes of a mother and experienced foreign correspondent, Lamb's journey brings her in touch with the people no one else is writing about: the abandoned victims of almost a quarter century of war.‘Of all books about Afghanistan, Christina Lamb’s is the most revealing and rewarding…a personal, perceptive and moving account of bravery in the face of staggering difficulties.’ Anthony Sattin, Sunday Times‘As an account of how Afghanistan got into its present state, and of the making of the grotesque regime of the Taliban, this book could not possibly be bettered. Brilliant.’ Matthew Leeming, Spectator‘Lamb’s book combines a love of Afghanistan with a fearless search for the human stories behind the past twenty-three years of war…Her book is not only a necessary education for the Western reader in the political warring that generated the torture, murder and poverty, but also a stirring lament for the country of ruins that was once better known for its poetry and mosques.’ James Hopkin, The Times

SHORTLISTED FOR THE BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE SHORTLISTED FOR THE ORWELL PRIZE ‘A wake-up call’ Amal Clooney ‘Devastating… rape and sexual abuse continue to be a pervasive and all-too-often hidden feature of conflict zones the world over’ HM Queen Camilla From award-winning war reporter and co-author of I Am Malala, this is the first major account to address the scale of rape and sexual violence in modern conflict. Christina Lamb has worked in war and combat zones for over thirty years. In Our Bodies, Their Battlefield she gives voice to the women of conflicts, exposing how in today’s warfare, rape is used by armies, terrorists and militias as a weapon to humiliate, oppress and carry out ethnic cleansing.Speaking to survivors first-hand, Lamb encounters the suffering and bravery of women in war and meets those fighting for justice. From Southeast Asia where ‘comfort women’ were enslaved by the Japanese during World War Two to the Rwandan genocide, when an estimated quarter of a million women were raped, to the Yazidi women and children of today who witnessed the mass murder of their families before being enslaved by ISIS. Along the way Lamb uncovers incredible stories of heroism and resistance, including the Bosnian women who have hunted down more than a hundred war criminals, the Aleppo beekeeper rescuing Yazidis and the Congolese doctor who has risked his life to treat more rape victims than anyone else on earth.Rape may be as old as war but it is a preventable crime. Bearing witness does not guarantee it won’t happen again, but it can take away any excuse that the world simply didn’t know.

A powerful and intensely human insight into the civil war in Zimbabwe, focusing on a white farmer and his maid who find themselves on opposing sides.One bright morning Nigel Hough, one of the few remaining white farmers in Mugabe’s Zimbabwe, received the news he was dreading – a crowd were at the gate demanding he surrender his home and land. To his horror, his family's much-loved nanny Aqui was at the head of the violent mob that then stole his homestead and imprisoned him in an outhouseBy tracing the intertwined lives of Nigel and Aqui – rich and poor, white and black, master and maid – through intimate and moving interviews, Christina Lamb captures not just the source of a terrible conflict, but also her own conviction that there is still hope for one of Africa’s most beautiful countries.

An extraordinary collection of reportage that tells the story of some of the most important world events of the past 16 years, from one of the most talented and intrepid female journalists at work today.Since leaving England aged 21 with an invitation to a Karachi wedding and a yearning for adventure, Christina Lamb has spent 20 years living out of suitcases, reporting from around the world and becoming one of Britain’s most highly regarded journalists. She has won numerous awards, including being named Foreign Correspondent of the Year a remarkable four times.‘Small Wars Permitting’ is a collection of her best reportage, following the principal events of the last two decades everywhere from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe. But Lamb’s main interest has always been in the untold stories, the people and places others don’t visit. Undaunted by danger, disease or despots, she has travelled by canoe through the Amazon rainforest in search of un-contacted Indians, joined a Rio samba school to infiltrate crime rackets behind Carnival and survived a terrifying ambush by Taliban.No less remarkable are the characters that Lamb meets along the way, from Marsh Arabs who covet Play Stations instead of buffaloes to an Armenian compère for performing dolphins with whom she travelled during the war in Iraq.Lamb’s writing is passionate, powerful and poetic, transforming reportage into literature. Through the stories she tells – and her own development from a self-confessed ‘war junkie’ to a devoted mother – Lamb attempts to comprehend the human consequences of conflict in the countries she has come to know.

From the award-winning co-author of I Am Malala, this book asks just how the might of NATO, with 48 countries and 140,000 troops on the ground, failed to defeat a group of religious students and farmers? How did the West’s war in Afghanistan and across the Middle East go so wrong? Farewell Kabul tells how the West turned success into defeat in the longest war fought by the United States in its history and by Britain since the Hundred Years War. It is the story of well-intentioned men and women going into a place they did not understand at all. And how, what had once been the right thing to do had become a conflict that everyone wanted to exit. It has been a fiasco which has left Afghanistan still one of the poorest and most dangerous nations on earth.The leading journalist on the region with unparalleled access to all key decision makers, Christina Lamb is the best-selling author of ‘The Africa House’ and I Am Malala, co-authored with Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai. This revelatory and personal account is her final analysis of the realities of Afghanistan, told unlike anyone before.

‘There will be an avalanche of books about the pandemic. None will be as eye-opening or humane or moving as Lamb’s’ DAILY TELEGRAPH A story of poverty, generosity and worlds colliding in modern Britain When Covid-19 hit the UK and lockdown was declared, Mike Matthews wondered how his four-star hotel would survive. Then the council called. The British government had launched a programme called ‘ Everyone In ’ and 33 rough sleepers – many of whom had spent decades on the street – needed beds.The Prince Rupert Hotel would go on to welcome well over 100 people from this community, offering them shelter, good food and a comfy bed during the pandemic.This is the story of how that luxury hotel spent months locked down with their new guests, many of them traumatised, addicts or suffering from mental illness. As a world-leading foreign correspondent turning her attention to her own country for the first time, Christina Lamb chronicles how extreme situations were handled and how shocking losses were suffered, how romances emerged between guests and how people grappled with their pasts together.Unexpected and profound, heart-warming and heartbreaking, this is a tale that gives a panoramic insight into modern Britain in all its failures, and people in all their capacities for kindness – even in the most difficult of times.

‘There will be an avalanche of books about the pandemic. None will be as eye-opening or humane or moving as Lamb’s’ DAILY TELEGRAPH A story of poverty, generosity and worlds colliding in modern Britain When Covid-19 hit the UK and lockdown was declared, Mike Matthews wondered how his four-star hotel would survive. Then the council called. The British government had launched a programme called ‘ Everyone In ’ and 33 rough sleepers – many of whom had spent decades on the street – needed beds. The Prince Rupert Hotel would go on to welcome well over 100 people from this community, offering them shelter, good food and a comfy bed during the pandemic.This is the story of how that luxury hotel spent months locked down with their new guests, many of them traumatised, addicts or suffering from mental illness. As a world-leading foreign correspondent turning her attention to her own country for the first time, Christina Lamb chronicles how extreme situations were handled and how shocking losses were suffered, how romances emerged between guests and how people grappled with their pasts together.Unexpected and profound, heart-warming and heartbreaking, this is a tale that gives a panoramic insight into modern Britain in all its failures, and people in all their capacities for kindness – even in the most difficult of times.

‘There will be an avalanche of books about the pandemic. None will be as eye-opening or humane or moving as Lamb’s’ DAILY TELEGRAPH A story of poverty, generosity and worlds colliding in modern Britain When Covid-19 hit the UK and lockdown was declared, Mike Matthews wondered how his four-star hotel would survive. Then the council called. The British government had launched a programme called ‘ Everyone In ’ and 33 rough sleepers – many of whom had spent decades on the street – needed beds.The Prince Rupert Hotel would go on to welcome well over 100 people from this community, offering them shelter, good food and a comfy bed during the pandemic.This is the story of how that luxury hotel spent months locked down with their new guests, many of them traumatised, addicts or suffering from mental illness. As a world-leading foreign correspondent turning her attention to her own country for the first time, Christina Lamb chronicles how extreme situations were handled and how shocking losses were suffered, how romances emerged between guests and how people grappled with their pasts together.Unexpected and profound, heart-warming and heartbreaking, this is a tale that gives a panoramic insight into modern Britain in all its failures, and people in all their capacities for kindness – even in the most difficult of times.

Christina Lamb's The Africa House is the bestselling account of an English gentleman and his African dream. In the last decades of the British Empire, Stewart Gore-Brown build himself a feudal paradise in Northern Rhodesia; a sprawling country estate modelled on the finest homes of England, complete with uniformed servants, daily muster parades and rose gardens. He wanted to share it with the love of his life, the beautiful unconventional Ethel Locke King, one of the first women to drive and fly. She, however, was nearly twenty years his senior, married and his aunt. Lorna, the only other woman he had ever cared for, had married another many years earlier. Then he met Lorna's orphaned daughter, so like her mother that he thought he had seen a ghost. It seemed he had found companionship and maybe love - but the Africa house was his dream and it would be a hard one to share.From a world of British colonials in Africa, with their arrogance and vision, to the final sad denouement. Leaving the once majestic house abandoned and a forgotten ruin of a bygone age Christina Lamb evokes a story full of passion, adventure and final betrayal.'The story she tells is in equal measure absorbing, affecting and bizarre' Sunday Telegraph'An amazing story of high hopes, lost love and ruined lives' Sunday TimesChristina Lamb is an award-winning journalist. Currently roving Foreign Affairs Correspondent for the Sunday Times, she has been a foreign correspondent for almost 20 years, living in Pakistan, Brazil and South Africa first for the Financial Times then the Sunday Times. She is the author of the best-selling book The Africa House as well as House of Stone, Waiting For Allah and Small Wars Permitting: Despatches from Foreign Lands.

“From now on, it’s drones, baby, drones”- Robert Gates, former U.S. Defense SecretaryThree writers. Two plays. One vital tale of power, sex and infighting at the top of the Washington establishment, and its far-reaching repercussions. As Barack Obama prepares to leave office, this world premiere double bill probes behind the scenes of America’s controversial drone wars, and asks what they will mean for our future.This TuesdayIt’s 5a.m. A CIA director learns her daughter has been injured in a car crash, a White House security adviser is sleeping with an intern, a Pentagon General is working out in the gym. This Tuesday, in an hour, they have a vital decision to make.The KidWednesday. A missile hits a wedding in Pakistan. 7000 miles away, two drone operators begin their celebration. Pushing the button was the start. If only it were the end…

I trettio år har den brittiska journalisten Christina Lamb bevakat krig och konflikter världen över. I alla krigszoner hon rapporterat ifrån har hon träffat kvinnor som utsatts för systematiska våldtäkter.

Våra kroppar, deras slagfält är Lambs storartade reportagebok om de tysta brott som drabbar kvinnor, sliter isär familjer och bryter ner samhällen. 

Lamb tar oss med på en resa mellan kontinenter och storstäder, byar och flyktingläger. Vi möter Victoire i Rwanda, Graciela i Argentina, Bakira i Bosnien och Naima i norra Irak – kvinnorna som har överlevt och som nu hjälper andra att läka. Men också kvinnorna som gått under. Våldtäkt som vapen i krig utförs inte av enstaka militärer, det utförs på massiv skala. Ändå är det krigsbrott som sällan utreds eller erkänns.

Den här boken levandegör kvinnorna världen över, sätter ljus på ofattbara mänskliga handlingar och ger en helt ny bild av hur krig ser ut.

Sagt om boken: 

Man kan inte kalla sig feminist om man inte läser den här boken. /.../ Christina Lamb vill punktera uppfattningen om att våld mot flickor och kvinnor är en naturvetenskaplig lag i konflikter. 

Sydsvenskan

Hennes texter är starka, faktabaserade, upprörande, ofattbara, tunga - och viktiga. 

Nya Wermlandstidningen

Det är en plågsam och upprörande bok att läsa. Dels för att kvinnor från jordklotets alla hörn berättar om fruktansvärda brutaliteter de utsatts för, och dels för att det är en berättelse om hur världen rätt mycket rycker på axlarna åt det.

SVT Kulturnyheterna

…en viktig historiebok i ett ämne som behöver beskrivas och erkännas.

Arbetaren

Att läsa den här boken är att vada genom sorg, skam och skuld. Ingen vill läsa den här boken. Läs den ändå!

Västmanlands läns tidning

I sin drabbande och akut angelägna reportagebok som nu utkommit på svenska berättar Lamb om kvinnoöden från hela världen och sätter ljus på ofattbara mänskliga handlingar och hur krig kan se ut.

Västerbottens-kuriren

Det här är den mest drabbande och upprörande bok jag någonsin läst. Det måste ha krävt mod att researcha och skriva den.

Anthony Beevor, historiker och författare

Röster ur boken:”Kvinnor är inte enbart åskådare till historien. Det är dags att sluta berätta bara halva berättelsen.”

” ’Mina hobbies är att röka och jaga våldtäktsmän.’ Hon skämtar inte. Hon har spårat upp över hundra hittills. 29 har blivit åtalade i Haag och 80 i Bosnien.”

”Trots att jag vittnade i en utländsk domstol med utländska domare i rockar som talade på ett annat språk var jag inte rädd, för när du talar sanning har du inget att frukta.”