Playing Atari with Saddam Hussein

Based on a True Story

By: Jennifer Roy, Ali Fadhil

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eBook | 6 September 2018

At a Glance

ePUB
176 Pages

Age
9 - 12

eBook

$7.99

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Video game villains and real-life dictators dominate daily life for eleven-year-old Ali

Ali Fadhil has very simple likes and dislikes. It is 1991 in Iraq and all Ali wants to do is read his comics and play football and video games. But President Saddam Hussein has other plans. After he invades neighbouring Kuwait, the U.S. and their allies launch Operation Desert Storm to force him out. Over the next forty-three days, Ali and his family would survive bombings, food shortages and constant fear.

Cinematic and timely, this is the story of how war changed one boy’s destiny forever and would one day bring him face to face with Saddam himself at the UN trial.

Industry Reviews

'Ali's narrative voice captures the tension of a boy who is young enough to cry when his mother burns a comic book to cook their rice and old enough to comprehend the absurdity of Americans dubbing the nightly bombing “the video game war." A disturbing but accessible portrait of a civilian child’s perspective on war.'