William Hoffer

I saw the film version with Sally Field before I bought the book, but I find that both works can stand on their own feet. This was an exciting, heartbreaking read, which held my interest from beginning to end. One can't help but admire Betty Mahmoody's tenacity and determination to keep Mahtob with her, as well as her refusal to give up on returning to the United States. For all of the book's complications (which I will address soon), it is obvious that Betty loves her daughter very much. show more The book is heavy on details; she spends a great deal of time describing Iranian customs and providing background information on their family situation. I found the flashback sections especially interesting, as they foreshadowed many of the events in Iran. The book also does a great job of drawing the reader into the action and into her mindset. Like (I assume) most readers, I was shocked by the behavior of her husband, Moody. He's the poster child for instability, irrationality, and deception.
That being said, there are some elements in this book that are problematic. It's written purely from Betty's point of view, and she does tend to self-aggrandize, even when evaluating bad decisions on her part. There were glaring clues throughout her and Moody's courtship and early married life that they were not going to work well together, where she should have divorced him. I don't understand how any woman could stay married to a man who wasn't getting along well with her children, or who wasn't willing to see her as an equal partner in the marriage. Moreover, her justification for bringing Mahtob to Iran didn't make sense, no matter how much she tried to rationalize it. I'm not trying to blame the victim, but much of this could have been prevented had Betty listened to her intuition and not shrugged it off.
Perhaps the most problematic nature of the book is its attitude towards Iranians and Middle Easterners in general. It is by no means a neutral or balanced text. Her descriptions of her Iranian extended family and their customs bear a striking resemblance to travelogue pictures and their method of describing the "native populations". The physical characteristics that she ascribes to people such as Ameh Bozorg are generally negative, highlighting their "sneering" and "pointed" features, as well as their lack of hygienic practices. Betty also comes off as believing that American customs and morality are on a higher plane than these people. Although she does highlight some helpful Iranians, they tended to have some Westernized aspect of their character which appealed to her, whether it be in their speech, interests, etc. Conversely, the Westerners that she met in Iran who weren't helpful to her had absorbed some aspect of Iranian and/or Islamic culture, which she feels was responsible for their insensitivity to her plight. At the same time, her feelings are somewhat understandable (although not excusable). She had little knowledge of Iranian culture beforehand, and then her major exposure to it was extremely negative.
All this being said, one cannot say that her experiences were not true, that she and her daughter didn't feel pain, or that her husband committed a heinous act. I've heard a number of people asking for proof that the events she described actually happened (from individual witnesses, the U.S. State Department, or the various embassies), that the conditions she described were actually subpar, or that it was really so difficult to leave the country if she wanted to. A counter-documentary called "Without My Daughter" was even released in 2002, where Mr. Mahmoody claimed that Betty kept Mahtob away from his intentionally, even though they wanted to remain in contact with each other. Does Betty have a bias? Absolutely. Could she have made better decisions? Yes. Are all Muslims fanatical extremists? Absolutely not. But that doesn't take away from the fact that she and her daughter went though a harrowing experience that no one should have to, or that her husband was in the wrong. There was no justification for what he did to his family, no matter how he was feeling.
In spite of its issues, this remains one of my favorite recent discoveries. Everyone who reads this book is sure to take away something different from it, be it positive, negative, or in between. For what it's worth, I highly recommend it. show less

I watched the movie a few weeks ago, and I was so intrigued by this story, I had to read the book. As my library not only didn't own a copy of the movie, they also didn't own a copy of the book, I opted to listen to it on Audible. I'm so glad it did, since it was read by Billy Hayes himself!
I'd heard that the movie was greatly sensationalized compared to the book, and I agree that there were some things changed and maybe *enhanced*.... however, it's not untrue that Billy Hayes went through show more several beatings, was treated horribly, and he struggled for ages (unsuccessfully) to get help from his family, friends, and the American Consulate to win his freedom legally. It seemed clear to me that the only way he could ever hope to win his freedom was, indeed, by riding the Midnight Express! I'm so glad he did! There are times, when you're in the middle of a story and it gets really bad/scary/dangerous and you find yourself wondering, "Will he make it? Is there any chance he'll survive?" And I felt like such an idiot at those times, because he obviously did, or the story wouldn't have been told! But KNOWING he made it didn't ease the fear I felt for him as he described the challenges he faced along the way. This book is extremely intense, and I felt that, despite the ugly bits, the hurtful, painful bits, there were also many, many parts that were beautiful. Billy made some great friendships and he learned a lot about his inner self. Those, I think, were the sources of his strength--the things that helped him survive his time in the Turkish prison as well as his escape. show less

I've read this book once a year for the past, oh, twenty years. The story of how the Andrea Doria collided with the Stockholm is in my mind waaay more interesting than the story of the Titanic. How was it possible for two mammoth ships to steer directly into each other? When tested by this disaster, some people became heroes and some behaved abominably. I will never forget the stories of the last man left alive aboard the Andrea Doria, the girl who was thrown in her bed from one ship to the show more other, the crewmembers of the Andrea Doria who dressed as women to get into the lifeboats, the woman who threw her baby into the sea because she panicked, the doctor who worked tirelessly to save his wife, or the Captain of the Andrea Doria finally addressing the ship after hours had passed with a single trembling word. With today's sad new "Chicken of the Sea" cruise shipwreck incident, this book becomes more timely than ever. show less

Part of the “response to disaster” reading theme. I am old enough to just barely remember – or at least to imagine I just barely remember – television coverage of the collision of the Andrea Doria and the Stockholm due south of Nantucket Island on July 25th, 1956. Saved! is your typical, workmanlike disaster story – description of the ships involved; capsule biographies of the various participants, some of whom have vultures of impending doom circling overhead; an account of the show more collision, with various anecdotes of bravery or cowardice and good or bad luck; and a postmortem with a follow-up of the survivors. This is well-written enough, despite the fact that you know in advance what’s going to happen. One of the interesting points from the disaster response standpoint was the passenger’s complaints that no crew members told them what was going on. Under the Incident Command System, there’s typically a press relations officer for talking to the media; it occurs to me that in situations like this there should be a officer charged with informing people involved in the disaster. Most incident response assumes you will have victims you will triage and survivors you will evacuate, but not people trapped in the middle of whatever’s going on who just want to know whatever’s going on. This may become more important, as disaster response agencies now often recommend shelter in place rather than evacuation for many situations, and because the people involved will probably have all sorts of access to partial and possibly incorrect information through cell phones.


So far, so good; however, despite a map of putative ship positions, I still can’t figure out exactly what happened. The Stockholm was coming out of New York bound for Sweden; the Andrea Doria was inbound from Italy. Both ships had radar, and each picked up the other well in advance of the collision. As near as I can tell, the contributing factors were:


* Both ships had radar, but only the Stockholm actually plotted positions; the Andrea Doria just took repeated bearings; it was not standard procedure to plot.


* Each ship decided the other was north of it, and assumed the other was going to maintain course and pass on the north. The Andrea Doria started a gradual turn to the south to give the Stockholm a little more room to pass; however; since the Stockholm was actually south of the Andrea Doria, this turn brought it closer to a collision course. Since the turn was gradual, the Stockholm’s bridge didn’t notice it because they weren’t taking bearings and plotting frequently enough.


* The Andrea Doria was sailing through a heavy fog bank until just before the collision; while the Stockholm was in the clear. Each ship assumed the other had similar visibility conditions.


* At the last minute, both ships took exactly the wrong evasive action. This is still the most puzzling part to me. Despite the fact that the Andrea Doria was now out the fog and each ship could see the other’s running lights, each apparently assumed the other was still going to pass on the north. The Andrea Doria made a hard turn to the south to allow the Stockholm more room to pass on the north; the Stockholm also made a hard turn to the south to allow the Andrea Doria more room to pass on the north. At 23:10, the Stockholm’s ice-reinforced bow hit the Andrea Doria just under the foremast and penetrated 30 feet into the hull. Almost all the 49 fatalities were asleep in their bunks and, quite literally, never knew what hit them. One lucky lady went to sleep on the Andrea Doria and woke up, still in her bed, on the forecastle of the Stockholm; another was washed out of the Andrea Doria and picked up floating by a rescue vessel. The most harrowing story is probably Robert Hudson’s; Hudson. Hudson was a merchant seamen who had been injured on the freighter Ocean Victory and was being sent back to the US; he had spent almost the whole trip in the Andrea Doria’s infirmary. However, on the day of the collision he felt a little better and the doctors decided he would get a more comfortable night’s rest in a vacant tourist-class cabin and gave him sleeping drugs to help – and then more or less forgot about him. As a result, Hudson woke up groggily at 05:10 to find all the lights out and his bunk at a rather unusual angle. He was able to reach a corridor with emergency lighting, but was unfamiliar with the ship because he’d spent the whole trip up till now in the infirmary. As a result, he had to grope his way to a deck and then to the stern, where he was picked up by a lifeboat from a rescue vessel just before the Andrea Doria went down. The rescue efforts appear to have been well organized; these were busy sealanes and a number of ships, including the liner Ile de France, were on hand quickly.


The Andrea Doria is still claiming lives; 15 scuba divers have died at the site. It’s deep (50 m), dark, and heavily tangled with fishing nets. The Stockholm was repaired and is still in service under a Portuguese flag. show less