Syria’s Secret Library
By Mike Thomson
Weidenfeld, 320pp, £18.99/$28
It was because of my love of books as well as my passion for human rights and humanitarian causes that I picked up Syria’s Secret Library: The True Story of How a Besieged Syrian Town Found Hope. It is one of most moving and inspiring books about a war zone that I have ever read.
It tells the remarkable story of how a small group of exceptionally brave people in Daraya, a besieged and bombarded town in Syria, kept their souls alive with literature even as they struggled for food and dodged bombs and snipers every day.
