A Year Under Sharia Law
Memoir of an American Couple Living and Working in Saudi Arabia
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Narrated by:
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Tyler Krzeszewski
About this listen
Three years into a financial crisis that shows no sign of loosening its grip, a young couple make the unpopular decision to teach English in Saudi Arabia. The choice of Saudi Arabia is based primarily on the best salary offer and an all-expenses-paid round-trip flight. Secondarily, it is to satiate a desire to explore a country steeped in mystery and taboo.
Little do they know that the experience will come with a price and change their lives in a profound way, witnessing human rights violations that go unchecked even up to today and an ultra-conservative culture wrestling with tradition and modernity.
A Year Under Sharia Law is written as a travel memoir with vignettes of daily life and interactions with the community at large. It was also written to shine a spotlight on the plight of impoverished ladies who come to Saudi Arabia in the hopes of earning a salary to send money back to their family. They find work as nannies and house maids, primarily. These ladies are often stripped of their rights in a patriarchy that makes them prime targets for unspeakable abuses. Their passports are held by their Saudi employees, and they essentially become prisoners.
This memoir is not only dedicated to them and their plight, but also the tireless and dangerous work done by journalists who are critical of Saudi Arabia’s human rights record. Some have paid the ultimate price.
©2019 Alex Fletcher (P)2020 Alex FletcherListeners also enjoyed...
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Aged eight, Dina Nayeri fled Iran along with her mother and brother and lived in the crumbling shell of an Italian hotel-turned-refugee camp. Eventually, she was granted asylum in America. She settled in Oklahoma, then made her way to Princeton University. In this book, Nayeri weaves together her own vivid story with the stories of other refugees and asylum seekers in recent years, bringing us inside their daily lives and taking us through the different stages of their journeys, from escape to asylum to resettlement.
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Amazing story of resilience and compassion
- By PAH on 09-06-19
By: Dina Nayeri
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Channel of Peace
- By: Kevin Tuerff
- Narrated by: Kevin Tuerff
- Length: 3 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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When Kevin Tuerff and his partner boarded their flight from France to New York City on September 11, 2001, they had no idea that a few hours later the world - and their lives - would change forever. After US airspace closed following the terrorist attacks, Kevin, who had been experiencing doubts about organized religion, found himself in the small town of Gander, Newfoundland, with thousands of other refugees or “come from aways”. Channel of Peace is a beautiful account of how the people of Gander rallied with boundless acts of generosity and compassion for the “plane people".
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a story of hope
- By Wendy Weiss on 07-20-18
By: Kevin Tuerff
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Schadenfreude, a Love Story
- Me, the Germans, and 20 Years of Attempted Transformations, Unfortunate Miscommunications, and Humiliating Situations That Only They Have Words For
- By: Rebecca Schuman
- Narrated by: Christa Lewis
- Length: 8 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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Schadenfreude is the story of a teenage Jewish intellectual who falls in love - in love with a boy (who breaks her heart), a language (that's nearly impossible to master), a culture (that's nihilistic but punctual), and a landscape (that's breathtaking when there's not a wall in the way). Rebecca is an everyday, misunderstood '90s teenager with a passion for Pearl Jam and Ethan Hawke circa Reality Bites until two men walk into her high school civics class: Dylan Gellner and Franz Kafka, hitching a ride in Dylan's backpack.
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A humorous, delectable read
- By Amazon Customer on 07-13-17
By: Rebecca Schuman
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Factory Girls
- From Village to City in a Changing China
- By: Leslie T. Chang
- Narrated by: Susan Ericksen
- Length: 14 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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A book of global significance that provides new insight into China, Factory Girls demonstrates how the mass movement from rural villages to cities is remaking individual lives and transforming Chinese society, much as immigration to America's shores remade our own country a century ago.
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Living in Shenzhen - and What A Disappointment
- By Abstraction on 03-01-10
By: Leslie T. Chang
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The Shanghai Free Taxi
- Journeys with the Hustlers and Rebels of the New China
- By: Frank Langfitt
- Narrated by: Frank Langfitt
- Length: 8 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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In this adventurous, original book, NPR correspondent Frank Langfitt describes how he created a free taxi service - offering rides in exchange for illuminating conversation - to go beyond the headlines and get to know a wide range of colorful, compelling characters representative of the new China. They include folks like "Beer", a slippery salesman who tries to sell Langfitt a used car; Rocky, a farm boy turned Shanghai lawyer; and Chen, who runs an underground Christian church and moves his family to America in search of a better, freer life.
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Too political
- By dah551 on 06-26-19
By: Frank Langfitt
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The Invisible Heart
- An Economic Romance
- By: Russell D. Roberts
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 6 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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The Invisible Heart takes a provocative look at business, economics, and regulation through the eyes of Sam Gordon and Laura Silver, teachers at the exclusive Edwards School in Washington, D.C. Sam lives and breathes capitalism. He thinks that most government regulation is unnecessary or even harmful. He believes that success in business is a virtue. He believes that our humanity flourishes under economic freedom. Laura prefers Wordsworth to the Wall Street Journal.
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One of Susie Bright's Misses
- By Anne in State College on 10-27-15
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The Monk of Mokha
- By: Dave Eggers
- Narrated by: Dion Graham
- Length: 8 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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Mokhtar Alkhanshali grew up in San Francisco, one of seven siblings raised by Yemeni immigrants in a tiny apartment. At age 24, unable to pay for college, he works as a doorman. Until: a statue of an Arab raising a cup of coffee awakens something in him. He sets out to learn the rich history of coffee in Yemen and the complex art of tasting and identifying varietals. He travels to Yemen, collects samples of beans, eager to bring improved cultivation methods to the farmers. And he is on the verge of success when civil war engulfs Yemen in 2015 and he is trapped in Sana'a.
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MOVING THE NEEDLE
- By Dog Fish on 02-20-18
By: Dave Eggers
What listeners say about A Year Under Sharia Law
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Samo3113
- 03-01-21
Take It For What It Is
I found this book mostly entertaining, though keep in mind that it's a memoir and not in any way an authoritative text on Saudi or it's human rights record. Certainly the authors had experiences worth sharing, and their work points to many fundamental differences between American and Saudi values. Their perspectives on life in Saudi are overwhelmingly negative (unsurprisingly) and I was left wanting something a bit more informative. It is useful to hear about firsthand experiences, though there were some mundane details. For example, I could have done without all the explanations of drama between English teachers. Overall it's a short read, and worth it if you want to hear a Westerner's view of daily life in Saudi.
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