A Gift from Darkness

How I Escaped with My Daughter from Boko Haram

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Pub Date Jan 23 2018 | Archive Date Jan 23 2018

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Description

An NPR Best Book of the Year

The inspirational story of a pregnant young Nigerian woman and the horrors she endured to save her unborn child when she was kidnapped by Boko Haram.


When she was nineteen, Patience Ibrahim's first husband was murdered by Boko Haram. She fled to the safety of her village and remarried several months later. Having prayed for a child for years, Patience is overjoyed when she discovers she is pregnant. But her joy is short-lived: Boko Haram soldiers are at her door. Brutally abducted and forced to convert to Islam, she lives in constant terror of what her kidnappers have in store for her. She finds herself alone in the world and fears her life is over. 

For two months, Patience hides her pregnancy while facing the brutalities meted out by Boko Haram. By the sheer force of her determination to protect her baby, she and her child are able to survive. Now, she has entrusted journalist Andrea C. Hoffmann with her story, a powerful first-person account of Boko Haram's atrocities in Nigeria and Cameroon.

One of the first testimonies on the terrorist group's war crimes in Western Africa, A Gift from Darkness poignantly shows the human toll of a crisis that demands attention.
An NPR Best Book of the Year

The inspirational story of a pregnant young Nigerian woman and the horrors she endured to save her unborn child when she was kidnapped by Boko Haram.


When she was nineteen...

Advance Praise

“This is a captivating, harrowing book. Patience Ibrahim’s story will rattle, enrage, and inspire you. Told with suspense, emotion, and sensitivity, A Gift from Darkness shines a sorely needed light on the gruesome world of Boko Haram. But this is more than an eyewitness account of monstrous cruelty—it is a tale of one woman’s remarkable courage and a stirring reflection on the power of faith and love.” —Adam Fifield, author of A Mighty Purpose: How Jim Grant Sold the World on Saving Its Children

A truly terrifying journey. This is the riveting story of the compelling, human, and horrific experience of Patience Ibhahim.” —Ramaa Mosley, producer of Girl Rising

Praise for Raif Badawi, The Voice of Freedom:

“Aided by Middle East reporter Hoffmann, [Ensaf] Haidar reveals not only the harsh treatment of her husband, sentenced to ten years in a Saudi Arabian prison and 1,000 lashes for the crime of apostasy, but also the severe limitations on the lives of women in Saudi Arabia…A sobering exposé of Saudi culture and a tribute to the courage and strength of both the author and her husband.” —Kirkus Reviews

“This is a captivating, harrowing book. Patience Ibrahim’s story will rattle, enrage, and inspire you. Told with suspense, emotion, and sensitivity, A Gift from Darkness shines a sorely needed light...


Available Editions

EDITION Other Format
ISBN 9781590518496
PRICE $15.95 (USD)

Average rating from 6 members


Featured Reviews

My first thought about this exceptional book was that it took me completely out of myself, and my own world. Patience, the protagonist, lived a life that no one could even imagine-twice abducted by Boko Haram, seeing her husband's decapitaded head laying on the ground, and giving birth alone, in the jungle. She survived all those horrendous events, and much more, ultimately being gifted with a beautiful daughter.

The author, Andrea Hoffmann, is a skilled author and journalist who won the trust and friendship of her protagonist. I appreciated reading and hearing Patience's story told in her way, rather than how the author thinks it should be told. The author also writes about her desire to fly to dangerous northern Nigeria and meeting up with a missionary, accompanying her there. A brave and selfless act that assisted in getting more of the story of the Boko Haram atrocities out into the world.

I commend Ms. Hoffmann on her exceptional book and her career as a writer of human rights stories.

Thank you NetGalley.

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Heartbreakingly touching and moving, I cried more then once while reading this book!

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