Zeitoun by Eggers (4 stars)

This is the true story of Abdulrahman. Zeitoun and his family in the aftermath of hurricane Katrina.  Their Kafkaesque experience demonstrates the ineffectiveness of government assistance and the inherent bias in our law enforcement and military societies against people who are of different faiths and ethnicities. Before hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, A. Zeitoun sent his wife and 4 children to Baton Rouge to stay with her relatives.  He chose to stay in New Orleans to look after his business and several rental properties as well as their own home.  After the hurricane Zeitoun recognized that he could be of help to the residents or animals who were stranded.  He found a canoe and rowed around the city helping where he could.  His wife begged him to leave after hearing reports of the terrible damage and lack of services in the city. She also saw the terrible flooding on T.V.  However, Zeitoun chose to stay in order to be of help.  His actions were at times heroic.  Unfortunately, the police and military suspecting him of looting, arrested Zeitoun, his tenant and his Syrian friend while they were visiting in the tenant’s house.  Because Zeitoun was a Syrian Muslim and because of military and police over reaction to the situation, Zeitoun found himself imprisoned. He was never read his rights.  He was not permitted to consult with an attorney and he was kept incommunicado from the outside world for more than 2 weeks.  His wife did not know what had become of him and she feared the worst.  He was not permitted to phone her.  No one would phone her on his behalf.  In part this was because there were few working phones and no judicial system in effect during the catastrophe.  Zeitoun was held in a dickinsonian prison.  I understand the point this book was trying to make.  However, I felt it failed in two respects.  First Kathy came from a dysfunctional family with 9 children.  Her conversion to Islam had more to do with that then her romantic attraction to Islam.  The book hints at this but does not emphasize it.  More should have been made of this.  She seems to want to be singled out for discrimination because of her hijab.  This is not normal behavior.  Additionally, Kathy had a son from a prior marriage.  He is barely mentioned in the book.  Zeitoun speaks with great affection and love for his three daughters, but he never mentions any feelings for his stepson.  I suspect there were problems in the relationship, because when the stepson turns 18 he moves out of the house to live with a friend.  There is no talk of his future or his further education being supported by Zeitoun.  So in the absence of any information on the relationship, I suspect it was not good.  Mentioning it would have taken away from the heroic Pollyanna image of Zeitoun that the author wanted to create.  I also do not understand why Kathy had to stay with relatives in a crowded and difficult situation when she could have stayed in a motel.  I know that hotel living can be expensive, but Zeitoun had a successful contracting business that surely could have afforded a two week stay in an inexpensive motel.  Instead Kathy drove to Phoenix to stay with Yuko, her friend. She then had to drive back when she learned that her husband was in prison in Louisiana.