Author(s): Nujood Ali with Delphine Minoui

Biography

The true story of a 10-year-old girl who won a divorce from the man she was forced to marry, courageously defying both Yemeni customs and her own family. Nujood's childhood came to an abrupt end when her father arranged for her to be married to a man three times her age. With harrowing directness, Nujood tells of abuse at her husband's hands, beginning with the very first night of her married life, and ending the day she slipped away during an errand. Instead of going to the market to buy bread, she took a taxi to the court building. That was the beginning of her odyssey. With the help of a woman lawyer, Chadha Nasser, NGOs and the local press, Nujood finally obtained her freedom, an extraordinary achievement in Yemen, where there is a conspiracy of silence about the fact that almost half the girls are married under the legal age. Since her victory, Nujood has given other young girls the courage to stand up to their society's customs.