Let Us Water the Flowers: The Memoir of a Political Prisoner in Iran 

In the summer of 1988, the Islamic Republic of Iran began a systematic execution of political prisoners. Overriding earlier sentences handed down by its own tribunals, the regime summarily hanged thousands of prisoners, and in great secrecy, transported the bodies to mass, unmarked graves. For more than two decades, the Iranian government has tried to hide the existence of these gravesites and attempted to destroy evidence of their whereabouts. Amnesty International estimates the cumulative death toll to be anywhere from 4,500 to 10,000 killed.

Against all odds, Jafar Yaghoobi survived this wave of state-sponsored killings. In the most comprehensive English-language memoir by a survivor of the mass killings, he recounts his experience as a political prisoner in Iran, as well as testimonials of others who shared the ordeal. 

In what Kirkus Reviews calls "a timely, inspiring story of the triumph of the human spirit in the face of oppression," Let Us Water the Flowers describes the courage, resistance, sacrifice, camaraderie, and solidarity of prisoners who refused to give up hope, even in the face of brutal interrogation, torture, and mortal fear. It also candidly depicts the cowering appeasement of other prisoners who broke down under the unrelenting pressure of prison authorities and became collaborators in the abuse and control of their fellow captives. In Yaghoobi's gripping narrative, Iran's prisons are revealed to be microcosms not only of Iranian society but also of the global human community, depicting the horrors that we are capable of inflicting on one another, while at the same time revealing the care, concern, and cooperation that can still flourish in the midst of utter chaos.

Jafar Yaghoobi

Released from prison in 1989, Yaghoobi subsequently escaped to Turkey before joining his wife and daughter in Germany. After settling in the United States, he worked as a genetics research scientist at the University of California, Davis, until his retirement in 2005. Since then, he has been active in bringing attention to human rights abuses in Iran.

During the mass killings of 1988, while in a solitary cell awaiting executioners to fetch and hang him, Yaghoobi made himself a promise: that if by chance he survived the massacre and was able to get out of Iran safely, he would one day tell the world what Islamist captors did to freedom fighters and political activists. Let Us Water the Flowers represents a small step toward fulfilling that promise.

A Long Silence: Memories of a German Refugee Child, 1941-1958  

After more than sixty years, the nightmarish sufferings of so many victims of Germany's Nazi regime have been documented extensively. Rarely, however, does one hear about the experiences of German children during World War II. Coming of age amidst the chaos, brutality, and destruction of war in their homeland, they had no understanding of what was happening around them and often suffered severe trauma and physical abuse. They too became victims of the madness perpetrated by the totalitarian state.

This haunting memoir -- called "compelling and thoroughly readable" by Lonesome Dove author Larry McMurtry -- tells the riveting story of one such German child.

"[P]oignant and powerful...filled with horror, joy, and sorrow... It ought to be read by every American," says Gordon S. Wood, Professor Emeritus, Brown University.

Born in Berlin in 1941, Sabina de Werth Neu knew little during her earliest years except the hardships and fear of a war refugee. She and her two sisters and mother were often on the run and sometimes homeless in the bombed-out cities of wartime Germany. At times they lived in near-starvation conditions. And as the Allies stormed through the crumbling German defenses, the mother and children were raped and beaten by marauding Russian soldiers. 

Sabina de Werth Neu

Illustrated by vintage black-and-white family photographs, the book is filled with poignant scenes: her abused but courageous mother desperately trying to protect her children through the worst; the sickening horror of viewing Holocaust footage on newsreels shortly after the war; the welcome sight of American troops bringing hot meals to local schools; and the glimmer of hope finally offered by the Marshall Plan, which the author feels was crucial to her own survival and that of Germany as a whole.

Now an American citizen, Sabina de Werth Neu is a retired therapist living in Miami. A Long Silence not only recalls her experience of a now-distant war, but also brings to mind the disrupting realities of present-day refugee children. Her book is "an engrossing account of the consequences of war and diplomacy for a single child," says Publishers Weekly. There is perhaps no more damning indictment of war than to read about its effects on children, its helpless victims. 

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For more personal stories of all types, additional memoirs from our catalog include: 

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