Aged 17, Lewis Alsamari was conscripted into the Iraqi army. Things went from bad to worse once his superiors discovered his ability to speak English, and Lewis was selected for Saddam's elite, top secret intelligence service, an offer he literally could not refuse. This left him with only one option - to escape from his native land, leaving his family behind him...

Going under the wire of the army compound where he was posted, Lewis was shot in the leg, making his escape - which required a gruelling journey in disguise across the desert at night with a group of Bedouin, at the mercy of ravenous wolves - all the more arduous.

Against the odds, Lewis survived this trek, made it across the border into Jordan, and eventually sought asylum the UK, where he had spent his childhood. Now he had to work out how to rescue his mother, brother and sister, who had been thrown into prison and tortured once Lewis' escape became known. The only thing which could help was money and lots of it, so Lewis fraudulently transferred GBP £37,500 from the accounts of William Hill (where he had a temporary job) into his own bank, and wired it to Baghdad in order to pay the necessary bribes. But, of course, it wasn't quite that simple...

"Out of Iraq" is an exhilarating and terrifying story of one man's escape from one of the harshest regimes of the modern era. It is testament both to the strength of the human spirit and to the extremes we'll go to in order to keep our families safe…

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LEWIS ALSAMARI

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~ Extract from OUT OF IRAQ ~

AUGUST 1994. THE IRAQI DESERT, SOMEWHERE NEAR THE JORDANIAN BORDER, SEVERAL HOURS BEFORE DAYBREAK:

I stood perfectly still and tried to accustom myself to the solitude and the silence. It took me some minutes to compose myself, but eventually I started to make my way towards the road. Now I was alone my senses became more heightened as I strained my eyes and my ears to judge if any unknown danger was close by. Occasionally I would look back and think that I caught a glimpse of the patrol cars' headlights; but if I did, they were distant – they would not be able to see me from so far. I could just make out the road from where I was, and there were no patrols ahead; I would be very unlucky to meet anybody now – unless I was forced to fire the Beretta, and as all seemed reasonably silent around me, I determined not to do that. I soon realised, however, that sounds in the desert could be deceptive.

More than once I stopped still because I thought I heard a noise alarmingly close, but I told myself over and over again that it was a faraway sound carried to me by the fickle night breeze. I kept the pace as fast as my wounded leg would allow, keeping my eyes fixed on the occasional light from the road ahead, and I realised that it was not only sounds that could be deceiving, but distances also. Although I had no conception of time, the road did not appear to be getting any closer, and the longer I hurried through that dark expanse, the more unnerving my solitude became. As I walked, I could feel the swab around my bullet wound become wet – clearly the stitches had opened slightly from the movement.

Then, out of the darkness, I heard a sound that immediately stopped me dead. It was not new to my ears – it was unmistakably the same howling that I had heard earlier that evening – but it was shockingly close. I stood perfectly still for some moments, aware only of the trembling whisper of my own heavy breath, before hearing another howl that made the blood stop in my veins. It was as loud as the first, and no less desperate, but it was not its closeness that filled me with a sickening sense of horror, it was the direction from which it came. The first wolf had been somewhere to my right, the second to my left. I have never known fear like it. A cold wave of dread crashed over me; I felt nauseous and all the strength seemed to sap from my body. I know I should have fired my gun in the air, but in that minute some other impulse took over, an impulse that forced any faculty of reason from my head and replaced it with blind panic. Foolishly, I ran. I could never have outrun them. They were lean, desperate and hungry; this was their territory. I was limping and terrified. The more noise I made, the more I attracted their attention. I became aware of other animals around me – I don't know how many, but it was clear they were hunting as a pack, and I was their quarry. Blinded by my tears, I stumbled, and their baying became more frenzied. Then, as if by some prearranged signal, the pack fell silent …

'Riveting'

'A Remarkable Story'

'Awesome...Immense'

'A stunning thriller...One of the most amazing stories you will read this year'

*25% of any purchase is made as a charitable donation by Lewis Alsamari for the benefit of:

CISRI - The UN division for Intergovernmental Institution for the use of micro-alga spirulina against malnutrition. CISRI's high moral mission of the institution is, therefore, to sensitize international community to provide adequate food supplement to starving people affected by food emergencies or endemic food crisis in Africa and the Middle East.

www.cisri.org