Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Ewa recommended this to me several years ago and although I have given it to several people as a gift I had not read it myself. 

Ali's memoir of her childhood in Africa and subsequent immigration to Europe is memorable and shocking.  She grows up in both Muslim Ethiopia and a secular Kenya, and as she gets older is troubled by the treatment of women in Islam.  Her childhood is very traditional - she is ritually circumcised, her absent father makes a lot of the family decisions, and she sees women being beholden to men's choices.  The first third of the book that covers this part of her life is gripping, but long.  At some points it was confusing as to why so much of the book was what felt like background.

The next part of the book chronicles her escape to the Netherlands where she seeks asylum and settles into this very different society.  She has a boyfriend and a job, and decompresses from her years of oppression.  The contrast between her life in the Netherlands and that of her life in Africa is where many of her political ideas come from.  At some point in the book she begins to argue quite aggressively that Islam is bad for women and thus bad for societies.  She suggests that any Islamic country is intrinsically backwards based on their treatment of women.

It is this core belief that begins Ali's ascent into politics, which is the subject of the third and final part of the book.  She becomes a highly public figure in Holland politics and, at times, is seen as quite contraversial.  As she struggles with the demands on her public life, she faces difficult choices in how much is at stake when she stands up for what she believes in.

I enjoyed reading about Ali's life and I appreciate the honesty in her memoir.  While the flow of the narrative was uneven, the story was fascinating.