The Desert and the Sea: 977 Days Captive on the Somali Pirate Coast

Michael Scott Moore, a journalist and author of Sweetness and Blood, combines personal narrative and rigorous investigative journalism in this profound and revealing memoir of his three-year captivity by Somali pirates - a riveting, thought-provoking, and emotionally resonant examination of foreign policy, religious extremism, and the costs of survival. In January 2012, while covering a Somali pirate trial in Hamburg for Spiegel Online International and funded by a grant from the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, Moore traveled to the Horn of Africa to write about piracy and potential solutions. Unfortunately, Moore himself was kidnapped and subsequently held hostage by Somali pirates. Experiencing conditions that would break even the strongest of spirits - physical injury, starvation, isolation, and terror - his survival stands as a testament to his incredible fortitude. In September 2014, after 977 days, he was finally released when his ransom was collected with the help of various US and German institutions, friends, colleagues, and his strong-willed mother.