Our Bodies, Their Battlefield

What War Does to Women

By: Christina Lamb

Narrated by: Christina Lamb - introduction, Antonia Beamish

Length: 14 hrs and 7 mins

Publisher's summary

SHORTLISTED FOR THE BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE

SHORTLISTED FOR THE ORWELL PRIZE

From award-winning war reporter and co-author of I Am Malala, this is the first major account to address the scale of rape and sexual violence in modern conflict.

Christina Lamb has worked in war and combat zones for over thirty years. In Our Bodies, Their Battlefield she gives voice to the women of conflicts, exposing how in today’s warfare, rape is used by armies, terrorists and militias as a weapon to humiliate, oppress and carry out ethnic cleansing.

Speaking to survivors first-hand, Lamb encounters the suffering and bravery of women in war and meets those fighting for justice. From Southeast Asia where ‘comfort women’ were enslaved by the Japanese during World War Two to the Rwandan genocide, when an estimated quarter of a million women were raped, to the Yazidi women and children of today who witnessed the mass murder of their families before being enslaved by ISIS. Along the way Lamb uncovers incredible stories of heroism and resistance, including the Bosnian women who have hunted down more than a hundred war criminals, the Aleppo beekeeper rescuing Yazidis and the Congolese doctor who has risked his life to treat more rape victims than anyone else on earth.

Rape may be as old as war but it is a preventable crime. Bearing witness does not guarantee it won’t happen again, but it can take away any excuse that the world simply didn’t know.

©2020 Christina Lamb (P)2020 HarperCollins Publishers Limited

Critic reviews

"A wake-up call to the magnitude and horrors of rape in war - the world's most neglected war crime. These women’s stories will make you weep, and then rage at the world's indifference." (Amal Clooney)

"Christina Lamb has done the impossible – and written women into history. This book, Our Bodies, Their Battlefield is an extraordinary achievement ofin depth journalism, powerful storytelling, grit and heart. A wake up call to the magnitude and horror of rape of women throughout history and the world." (Eve Ensler, author of The Vagina Monologues)

"For millennia mass rape has been a weapon of war. But the testimony of abuse is almost entirely absent from all recorded history. At last this brave, beautiful and brutal book allows victims to speak – devastatingly, inspirationally." (Bettany Hughes)