Susan Burton Knihy

The author describes his experiences as he traveled to Afghanistan with his father, who was the spokesman for President Hamid Karzai and then became the governor of Kunar. Reprint.

"Susan Burton is ready to come clean. Happily married with two children, working at her dream job, she has lived a secret life of compulsive eating and starving for twenty-five years. This is a relentlessly honest ... narrative of living with binge-eating disorder"--

Strange things are happening in Muriel Grayson's safe and plodding routine of eat-sleep-work-repeat! Not just strange. Unusual. Transforming. She's hearing the clarion call of adventure. Leaving her job and old name behind, she revisits a dream of becoming an archaeologist by applying to attend a summer dig in coastal Yorkshire. Led by the British poster boy for archaeology, Jack Shepherd, the dig is trying to locate a bronze age burial site. The newly named Samantha Grayson arrives on site and is immediately at odds with Jack Shepherd over the dig location. Through studying local folklore, myth and legend, Samantha's adventure becomes a personal odyssey, an obsession to find the burial site on her own. Along the way, she makes new friends and finds allies in her quest, uncovers her courage and self-belief, and undergoes emotional shifts and spiritual experiences so profound and closely entwined that she no longer sees any separation between them. And on one truly magical afternoon, amongst the sand dunes, the truth is revealed.

One woman's remarkable odyssey from tragedy to prison to recovery'and recognition as a leading figure in the national justice reform movement. Susan Burton's world changed in an instant when her five-year-old son was killed by a van on their street in South Los Angeles. Consumed by grief and without access to professional help, Susan self-medicated, becoming addicted first to cocaine, then crack. As a resident of South L.A., an impoverished black community under siege by the War on Drugs, it was but a matter of time before Susan was arrested. She cycled in and out of prison for fifteen years; never was she offered therapy or treatment for addiction. On her own, she eventually found a private drug rehabilitation facility. Once clean, Susan dedicated her life to supporting women facing similar struggles. She began by greeting women as they took their first steps of freedom, welcoming them into her home, providing a space of safety and community. Her organization, A New Way of Life, now