Book Review: 1001 Nights In Iraq

BOOK REVIEW: 1001 NIGHTS IN IRAQ
reviewed by Brian Palmer

Entertainment Weekly
June 22, 2007

SECTION: THE REVIEWS: BOOKS; Pg. 73 No. 940
Shant Kenderian
Memoir
PAPERBACK

Harrowing doesn’t begin to describe Kenderian’s 10-year ordeal. After
living in Chicago for two years, the 17-year-old Armenian Christian
Iraqi went home in 1980 to visit his estranged father. While there,
he was forced into the Iraqi navy during Saddam Hussein’s war with
Iran. When Saddam invaded Kuwait in 1990, he was press-ganged
back into the navy. Then things got worse. Kenderian writes
matter-of-factly, with the stoicism of someone who has endured the
seemingly unendurable. But his story is mind-blowing enough to keep
you turning the pages.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Emil Lazarian

“I should like to see any power of the world destroy this race, this small tribe of unimportant people, whose wars have all been fought and lost, whose structures have crumbled, literature is unread, music is unheard, and prayers are no more answered. Go ahead, destroy Armenia . See if you can do it. Send them into the desert without bread or water. Burn their homes and churches. Then see if they will not laugh, sing and pray again. For when two of them meet anywhere in the world, see if they will not create a New Armenia.” - WS