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The Prince of Bagram Prison
A riveting and intricate literary thriller from the author The New York Times Book Review says “speaks up in a voice that gets your attention like a rifle shot . . . clean, direct, and a little dangerous.”
Army Intelligence reservist Kat Caldwell is teaching Arabic at a military college in Virginia when the order Retired spy chief Dick Morrow needs to find a CIA informant who has slipped away from his handler in Spain and may be heading to Morocco.
Jamal was a prisoner whom Kat interrogated when she worked at Bagram Airbase in Afghanistan. Having gained his trust, she is now expected to discover his whereabouts on a treacherous trail that leads from Madrid’s red-light district to the slums of Casablanca. But when a British Special Forces soldier is murdered just as he is about to give testimony on the death of a Bagram detainee, Kat begins to suspect that the real story here is one of the cover-up of U.S.-sanctioned torture. And when in desperation Jamal contacts his former CIA handler, he unwittingly rekindles a bitter struggle between the one man who can save him and the one who wants him dead.
Praise for Alex Carr’s An Accidental American
“A swift, clean, nuanced thriller . . . deeply atmospheric.”
–The Seattle Times, Best Crime Novels of 2007
“Demonstrates fiction’s power to follow a shard of glass from the great explosion, to examine its bloodstained edges and explore the passion, foolishness, tragedy and flawed humanity traced by its journey toward discovery . . . In this novel, we learn how to decipher the language of war, its mismanaged intent and complex ramifications.”
–January Magazine, Best Books of 2007
Army Intelligence reservist Kat Caldwell is teaching Arabic at a military college in Virginia when the order Retired spy chief Dick Morrow needs to find a CIA informant who has slipped away from his handler in Spain and may be heading to Morocco.
Jamal was a prisoner whom Kat interrogated when she worked at Bagram Airbase in Afghanistan. Having gained his trust, she is now expected to discover his whereabouts on a treacherous trail that leads from Madrid’s red-light district to the slums of Casablanca. But when a British Special Forces soldier is murdered just as he is about to give testimony on the death of a Bagram detainee, Kat begins to suspect that the real story here is one of the cover-up of U.S.-sanctioned torture. And when in desperation Jamal contacts his former CIA handler, he unwittingly rekindles a bitter struggle between the one man who can save him and the one who wants him dead.
Praise for Alex Carr’s An Accidental American
“A swift, clean, nuanced thriller . . . deeply atmospheric.”
–The Seattle Times, Best Crime Novels of 2007
“Demonstrates fiction’s power to follow a shard of glass from the great explosion, to examine its bloodstained edges and explore the passion, foolishness, tragedy and flawed humanity traced by its journey toward discovery . . . In this novel, we learn how to decipher the language of war, its mismanaged intent and complex ramifications.”
–January Magazine, Best Books of 2007
289 pages, Paperback
First published December 24, 2008
5 people are currently reading
80 people want to read
About the author
Alex Carr
31 books5 followersAlex Carr is a pseudonym of writer Jenny Siler.
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.
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Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews
March 19, 2008
This was actually much more than a good airplane read. A very good novel. Well written, a mix of interesting characters, and a brief glimmer into Moroccan history.
June 25, 2022
Rebel woman gives birth to baby in Moroccan prison, twelve years later a manhunt for the “orphaned” child involves Military and Secret Forces jumping from Viet Nam in the 1970s to Afghanistan post 9/11. Confusing cast of characters and locations left me feeling the horror but unsure of what is happening where and when.
March 9, 2016
After reading Alex Carr's first novel (at least, the first under that name), AN ACCIDENTAL AMERICAN, I was anxious to get my hands on her latest, THE PRINCE OF BAGRAM PRISON. Feeling slight trepidation that the first amazing novel written under that pseudonym might be a hard act to top, I nevertheless got hold of a copy, as soon as I could.
I'm happy to say that this book only deepened my respect for Carr and increased my devotion to her work.
This isn't to say that THE PRINCE OF BAGRAM PRISON is a novel that everyone will embrace. As in her previous book, Carr engages in a good deal of narrative time shifting. And, unlike AN ACCIDENTAL AMERICAN, in which different people tended to show up at different times, the time shifts in this book tend to involve the same people throughout--so it's easy to get confused about what year it is and where you are exactly when the shifts take place. But if you pay attention, the effort will pay off.
Like her previous book, Carr is dealing in the shadowy world of espionage--this time, though, she focuses on the post-9/11 world (flashing back, now and then, to the final throes of the Vietnam War). We meet Kat Caldwell, an Army intelligence reservist, who's called away from her teaching post at a Virginia military college to help locate a young boy--a CIA informant--who's disappeared. Kat is enlisted to aid a not-so-nice (to really understate the matter) intelligence operative in this quest, because she grew to know the young man while interrogating him at Bagram Prison.
The entire review can be accessed at http://thebookgrrl.blogspot.com/2009/...
I'm happy to say that this book only deepened my respect for Carr and increased my devotion to her work.
This isn't to say that THE PRINCE OF BAGRAM PRISON is a novel that everyone will embrace. As in her previous book, Carr engages in a good deal of narrative time shifting. And, unlike AN ACCIDENTAL AMERICAN, in which different people tended to show up at different times, the time shifts in this book tend to involve the same people throughout--so it's easy to get confused about what year it is and where you are exactly when the shifts take place. But if you pay attention, the effort will pay off.
Like her previous book, Carr is dealing in the shadowy world of espionage--this time, though, she focuses on the post-9/11 world (flashing back, now and then, to the final throes of the Vietnam War). We meet Kat Caldwell, an Army intelligence reservist, who's called away from her teaching post at a Virginia military college to help locate a young boy--a CIA informant--who's disappeared. Kat is enlisted to aid a not-so-nice (to really understate the matter) intelligence operative in this quest, because she grew to know the young man while interrogating him at Bagram Prison.
The entire review can be accessed at http://thebookgrrl.blogspot.com/2009/...
May 18, 2009
This book was too confusing. The author jumps from time period to time period, and from place to place, without any warning whatsoever. I was so confused about where and what year everything was taking place throughout the first 80 pages that I almost stopped reading it. All in all, the premise could have been solid,(Arabic-speaking female in the military protects a young "Guatanomo" type detainee and uncovers torture & conspiracy along the way), but all in all it was too confusing and the ending was way too predictable.
December 31, 2019
Dramaturgisch gut gebaute Geschichte über die fatalen Folgen und damit auch die Vorgeschichte des 11. September 2001. Es geht, anders als der Titel und der Klappentext vermuten lassen, weniger um die konkreten Verhöre, sondern eher um einen Jungen, der hoffnungsvoll auf ein besseres Leben hofft und das Grauen erlebt hat, dabei zwischen die Räder der Geheimdienste steckt, die nun alle zum Schweigend bringen wollen. Durch kurze Spotlights und Kapitel entwickelt Siler eine kurzweilige, hintergründige Geschichte. Die Analyse der ZEIT-Edition ist dagegen sehr oberflächlich, bietet keine neuen Erkenntnisse und ist verzichtbar.
October 7, 2017
A complex tale of intrigue starting in Afghanistan and ending in Europe and North Africa. Locales are painted with a vivid brush and characters are engrossing. The non-linear time span is not always easy to follow, but resolves into a logical work. Miss Carr does very well getting inside women's psyche, but is a bit less proficient when it comes to men.
December 17, 2017
The Prince of Bagram by Alex Carr is both a literary thriller and a lesson in the religion and culture of the Middle East. Kat Caldwell is an Army Intelligence Reservist who is reactivated to find a young boy, Jamal, a CIA informant who has gone missing. As she investigates the case her loyalties are tested and she acquires a new appreciation for the Middle East and its people.
March 10, 2017
I would rate this one as only "okay". It introduced too many characters too soon and you never really fully understood the reasoning behind what it was they did.
Want to read
December 9, 2019Synopsis: Army Intelligence reservist Kat Caldwell is teaching Arabic in Virginia when she is asked to help find a CIA informant in Morocco.
April 7, 2020
Good story. I enjoyed the parts with the boy but, kind of skimmed through the Vietnam sections (Harry)
May 22, 2010
PROTAGONIST: Kat Caldwell; Army Ready Reserve
SETTING: Madrid; Afghanistan
SERIES: Standalone
RATING: 2.75
At one time, Kat Caldwell, a member of the Army Ready Reserve and a skilled speaker of Arabic, was assigned to interrogate a boy named Jamal who was housed in Bagram Prison in Afghanistan. Jamal has managed to survive by his wits for his first 15 years. After having spent years in an unsavory orphanage in Casablanca, he is wise beyond his years. Escaping from the prison, he has managed to make his way to Madrid, where he is serving as an informer for the CIA. Sensing danger in his latest assignment, he flees. Because Jamal trusted Kat, she is recruited to try to find him. At the same time, Jamal has reached out to his former CIA handler, Harry Comfort, who joins in the search.
What Kat finds as she begins the quest is that there is some kind of cover-up going on, one that may involve torture and other unsavory acts. She soon fears for their lives, with danger coming from within her own organization. At the same time, she is appalled by what she discovers about Jamal's past life, the degrading conditions in which he lived and the unspeakable acts he was made to perform. Kat has to make some hard choices along the way, choices that may mean that she can never return to her former life.
At least I think that's what happened. I found it almost impossible to follow what was going on in this book, which was very frustrating. The chapters alternated between different characters, different settings and different time periods. There was rarely a time when there was a straightforward linear narrative flow where you would follow a plot thread for more than a short period. I was completely and thoroughly confused throughout most of the book. In addition to the main narrative line, there are subplots galore detailing the intricacies of various love affairs, betrayed friendships, political malfeasance and more.
Carr writes wonderful prose, which helped make up somewhat for the structural deficiencies of the book. In addition, she did an excellent job in revealing disperse geographic and cultural settings. It's too bad that the tangled labyrinth of the narrative overrode the positive characteristics of this book.
SETTING: Madrid; Afghanistan
SERIES: Standalone
RATING: 2.75
At one time, Kat Caldwell, a member of the Army Ready Reserve and a skilled speaker of Arabic, was assigned to interrogate a boy named Jamal who was housed in Bagram Prison in Afghanistan. Jamal has managed to survive by his wits for his first 15 years. After having spent years in an unsavory orphanage in Casablanca, he is wise beyond his years. Escaping from the prison, he has managed to make his way to Madrid, where he is serving as an informer for the CIA. Sensing danger in his latest assignment, he flees. Because Jamal trusted Kat, she is recruited to try to find him. At the same time, Jamal has reached out to his former CIA handler, Harry Comfort, who joins in the search.
What Kat finds as she begins the quest is that there is some kind of cover-up going on, one that may involve torture and other unsavory acts. She soon fears for their lives, with danger coming from within her own organization. At the same time, she is appalled by what she discovers about Jamal's past life, the degrading conditions in which he lived and the unspeakable acts he was made to perform. Kat has to make some hard choices along the way, choices that may mean that she can never return to her former life.
At least I think that's what happened. I found it almost impossible to follow what was going on in this book, which was very frustrating. The chapters alternated between different characters, different settings and different time periods. There was rarely a time when there was a straightforward linear narrative flow where you would follow a plot thread for more than a short period. I was completely and thoroughly confused throughout most of the book. In addition to the main narrative line, there are subplots galore detailing the intricacies of various love affairs, betrayed friendships, political malfeasance and more.
Carr writes wonderful prose, which helped make up somewhat for the structural deficiencies of the book. In addition, she did an excellent job in revealing disperse geographic and cultural settings. It's too bad that the tangled labyrinth of the narrative overrode the positive characteristics of this book.
November 12, 2015
Well I finished it, so that already puts it ahead of many other books. But, at the end I hated it. It literally seemed a completely pointless read, a story about something and ultimately nothing.
I also have to add that for somebody with my eyesight the font used at the beginning of the chapters was literally indecipherable and that was annoying (hardback edition).
So, there you go, sorry I cannot be more help, but this book and I never clicked.
I also have to add that for somebody with my eyesight the font used at the beginning of the chapters was literally indecipherable and that was annoying (hardback edition).
So, there you go, sorry I cannot be more help, but this book and I never clicked.
August 21, 2008
A quick read with some interesting info about how our whole CIA, anti-terror, etc. framework works, at least according to the author. Writing is okay and sometimes predictable, but still an entertaining story.
May 10, 2016
Interesting book, although I found most of the characters to be anywhere from unlikeable to loathsome. And I really hate the way some authors give their characters cutesy last names, like Ms. Carr did with Harry Comfort. Comfort? Really? That's just plain dumb.
November 29, 2014
An engaging spy-vs-spy novel that offers some insight into possibilities of the very complicated relations between different agencies. There are the usual 'cast of characters' and much of the story occurs in Casablanca - but a good read.
May 29, 2010
This thoughtful espionage novel is timely and often beautifully written. Carr (pen name of Jenny Siler) blends three narratives into an exciting and moving conclusion.
September 11, 2009
Very enjoyable and thoughtful thriller.
January 8, 2012
I am going to Morocco for a couple months so this was an interesting book for me to read. I liked how it skipped from person to person. It really made me pay attention.
February 11, 2012
Das Buch lag jetzt wochenlang bei mir rum und ich kam einfach nicht weiter. Es war nicht wirklich unspannend, aber wohl nicht die richtige Zeit dafür...
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February 17, 2015Touches on the abuse at Bragram prison.
Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews