Ken Ballen - Terrorists in Love: The Real Lives of Islamic Radicals

Praise for Terrorists in Love

Written by [a] former federal prosecutor, [ Terrorists in Love ] tracks the quotidian events that can lead sensitive young men to violent jihad. The result is an unusual atlas of extremisma riveting, behind-the-scenes look at the events that turned six young Muslims into terrorists. Heart-wrenching, haunting, [the book argues] that what all these Islamic radicals have in common is a dearth of love on earth.

The Washington Post

[S]ix fully drawn portraits of people often reduced to caricatures in American thinking. [Ballen] adds nuance to a problem that Americans have tended to understand only in terms of good and evil a much more humanthough no less terrifyingpicture of [those] committed to defeating the United States and Western civilization.

The Boston Globe

Terrorists in Love is more than a captivating read. It provides fresh insight into how al-Qaeda and its jihadist allies have manipulated young Muslim men into following a hateful and destructive ideology that kills countless innocentsmostly other Muslims. We have heard a great deal about al-Qaedas recruitment and training process from U.S. experts, but Ballen describes the terrorism phenomenon in the terrorists own words, bringing deeper understanding to the issue.

Foreign Policy

Ken Ballen is someone who gets it [going] to significant lengths to corroborate the key facts of each individuals biography by consulting the relevant documents and witnesses he could track down. The result is one of the most in-depth looks at individual terrorists lives that is currently available, help[ing] to reverse some major misconceptions. [I]t engages the emotions, challenging readers bringing us closer to the real motives of terrorists, and thus closer to the truth.

The Huffington Post

Illuminating, if harrowing, real-life love stories of Muslim extremists. From their sexual desires and liaisons to frustration with the backlash against these romantic fantasies, to mystical dreams and fiery verses summoning them to martyrdom, the book explores intimate sparks of Islamic fundamentalism [A] must-read.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch

[A] disturbing, intimate look inside another world.

San Jose Mercury News

Revealing, often touching.

Kirkus Reviews

In a ground-breaking book, author Ken Ballen seeks to dispel our mislaid conceptions of terrorism in order to show the personal struggles and inner demons that inspire an individual to dedicate their life to the jihad. The depth of emotion that Ballen captures is at times enlightening and at other[s] disturbing. Traveling the gradient between true love, fear, and absolute hatred Ballen shows the motivations that drive one to become a terrorist.

Urban Times

An unprecedented and unusual look at Islamic radicalism.

Publishers Weekly

The 9/11 Commission grappled with the question of what drove the nineteen hijackers to their terrorist acts in 2001, but we did not have time to investigate and fully understand their motives. Ken Ballens exhaustive research, scores of interviews, and gripping writing make Terrorists in Love a uniquely valuableand sometimes chillingbehind-the-scenes account of the extreme beliefs that often fuel the actions of jihadist militants.

Lee H. Hamilton, former congressman and co-chair of the 9/11 Commission

Ken Ballen has managed the impossible for an American. He has worked his way into the intimate thoughts and frustrations and family conflicts that drove six young Muslims toward the jihadist movement, and he presents his findings in a series of compelling narratives.

David K. Shipler, Pulitzer Prizewinning author of Arab and Jew and The Rights of the People: How Our Search for Safety Invades Our Liberties

Ballen not only gets beneath the skin of terrorists, but all the way into their hearts, revealing unimaginable emotional and personal secrets. He has shed surprising light on the never-ending question about militant jihadiswhat are they thinking? Anyone who wants to know ought to read this unusual book.

Jane Mayer, bestselling author of The Dark Side

Its simply astonishing how much Ken Ballen, an outsider, penetrated the closed world of Islamic radicals. In a fast-moving, absorbing, and at times shocking narrative, Ballen destroys stereotypes and defies conventional wisdom by allowing the enemies to speak for themselves. America, meet the terrorists, really for the first time. And if you find yourself in the strange position of empathizing with them, dont recoil in horror, for you might just have stumbled upon that unexpected insight that could help design a more effective response.

Ammar Abdulhamid, former Islamic radical and leading prodemocracy activist in the Arab world

Terrorists in Love shatters the dominant dispassionate treatment of modern-day Islamic purveyors of death and destruction and instead offers a profoundly intimate portal into the fragile, emotional, even sexual factors that drive their behavior. Ballen blasts past the clichs about what animates terrorists and takes readers to places that no one has gone before. The profiles and revelations in this book are at times as uncomfortable as they are vital to appreciate what lies in the mind of some terrorists. I couldnt put the book down.

Steve Clemons, Washington editor-at-large, The Atlantic , and senior fellow and founder, American Strategy Program