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I was browsing the library for true crime books and saw this left on the side: Enslaved by Rahila Gupta. Of course I picked it up, had a read of the blur and a quick flick through the first few pages. I counted my lucky stars that somebody had left it lying around and it had caught my eye. I had been looking for a book like this for a long time.
Enslaved is a collection of interviews with people trafficked into the UK and forced into slavery. We hear from Farhia, a woman who was smuggled out of a war-torn Somalia into the UK and promised food and money in exchange for sex and domestic slavery. Natasha is a young Russian girl forced into prostitution, Naomi a pregnant child trafficked from Sierra Leone locked away as a domestic slave. The sole male interviewee, Liu is smuggled into the UK and is still living in fear of the Triads. The last interview is with Amber, a woman forced from her family home in Punjab into a marriage to a man in the UK, who is abused physically, emotionally, and sexually by her husband and his family.
Gupta captures the characters of each person extremely well, and each story reads with its own personality and individuality. There are breaks in the stories where Gupta explains background details - such as UK laws, policies, and customs, or particular details which help gain a better understanding of the person's story. The inability and unwillingness of the victims to even now discuss certain aspects render the whole account even more poignant.
Enslaved is a gut-wrenching insight into a fully-functioning world which operates around us. It is eye-opening and overwhelming to realise such things occur beneath our very noses. There were times when I had to close the book and take a few deep breaths, times when I was shaking with rage, filled with sadness, helplessness. I have even had to take a few days' break from the book in order to gather my thoughts and return with a more open frame of mind.
Enslaved is a harsh but necessary read. Compelling, disturbing, and well-written.
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Genre: Non-fiction
Publisher: Portobello Books
Date of publication: 1st May 2008
Pages: 320
My rating: 3.5Â out of 5