Even Silence Has an End: My Six Years of Captivity in the Colombian Jungle »

Born December 25, 1961, in Bogotá, Colombia, Ingrid Betancourt was a politician and presidential candidate celebrated for her determination to combat widespread corruption. In 2002 she was taken hostage by the FARC, a brutal terrorist guerrilla organization. For more than six and a half years, the FARC held her hostage in the Colombian jungle. She was rescued on July 2, 2008.

Ingrid Betancourt tells the story of her captivity in the Colombian jungle, sharing powerful teachings of resilience, resistance, and faith.

Born in Bogotá, raised in France, Ingrid Betancourt at the age of thirty-two gave up a life of comfort and safety to return to Colombia to become a political leader in a country that was being slowly destroyed by terrorism, violence, fear, and a pervasive sense of hopelessness. In 2002, while campaigning as a candidate in the Colombian presidential elections, she was abducted by the FARC. Nothing could have prepared her for what came next. She would spend the next six and a half years in the depths of the jungle as a prisoner of the FARC. Even Silence Has an End is her deeply personal and moving account of that time. Chained day and night for much of her captivity, she never stopped dreaming of escape and, in fact, succeeded in getting away several times, always to be recaptured. In her most successful effort she and a fellow captive survived a week away, but were caught when her companion became desperately ill; she learned later that they had been mere miles from freedom.

The facts of her story are astounding, but it is Betancourt's indomitable spirit that drives this very special account, bringing life, nuance, and profundity to the narrative. Attending as intimately to the landscape of her mind as she does to the events of her capture and captivity, Even Silence Has an End is a meditation on the very stuff of life-fear and freedom, hope and what inspires it. Betancourt tracks her metamorphosis, sharing how in the routines she established for herself-listening to her mother and two children broadcast to her over the radio, daily prayer-she was able to do the unthinkable: to move through the pain of the moment and find a place of serenity.

Freed in 2008 by the Colombian army, today Betancourt is determined to draw attention to the plight of hostages and victims of terrorism throughout the world and it is that passion that motivates Even Silence Has an End. The lessons she offers here-in courage, resilience, and humanity-are gifts to treasure.

The New York Times Book Review - Caroline Elkins

Captive for more than a year in the jungles of Colombia, Ingrid Betancourt took to her insect infested cot, drained by despair. Fat Martha, her aptly nicknamed guard, had brought fresh news: the hell in which Betancourt was living wasn't harsh enough. A veritable concentration camp, complete with chain-link fences and barbed wire, was being thrown up in haste under the canopies of the country's impenetrable interior. In her gripping memoir…Betancourt captures the despondency wrought by Fat Martha's pronouncement with a blend of power and self-awareness that inscribes not just this one disturbing moment but her account's every page.

1 Escaping The Cage 1

2 Farewell 26

3 The Abduction 35

4 "El Mocho" Cesar 47

5 Sonia's Camp 57

6 The Death of My Father 73

7 Falling Into The Abyss 78

8 Taming The Hornets 86

9 The Strains of Communal Life 101

10 Proof of Life 109

11 The Little Wooden House 114

12 Ferney 122

13 Learning To Weave 127

14 Melanie's Seventeenth Birthday 131

15 Resentment and Remission 135

16 The Raid 141

17 The Cage 150

18 Friends Who Come and Go 154

19 Voices from The Outside 159

20 A Visit from Joaquín Gómez 163

21 Second Proof of Life 171

22 The Fortune-Teller 176

23 An Unexpected Encounter 180

24 Giovanni's Camp 184

25 In The Hands of The Shadow 190

26 Sombra's Serenade 196

27 The Barbed Wire 199

28 The Satellite Antenna 206

29 Inside The Prison 209

30 The Arrival of The Americans 214

31 The Big Row 219

32 Roll Call 225

33 Human Misery 229

34 Lucho's Illness 233

35 A Sad Christmas 242

36 The Bickering 250

37 The Chicken Run 256

38 Back in The Prison 262

39 Radio Roundup 268

40 Gloria's Children 278

41 The Petty Things of Hell 281

42 The Dictionary 286

43 My Friend Lucho 289

44 The Child 293

45 The Strike 298

46 Birthdays 303

47 The Big Departure 307

48 Hepatitis 310

49 Guillermo's Frisk 315

50 Unexpected Support 318

51 The Hammock 323

52 Selling Hope 327

53 The Group of Ten 335

54 The Endless March 343

55 The Chains 351

56 The Honeymoon 354

57 At The Gates of Hell 361

58 Descent Into Hell 367

59 The Devil 372

60 Now or Never 377

61 The Escape 383

62 Freedom 395

63 The Choice 407

64 The End of The Dream 411

65 Punishment 416

66 The Retreat 421

67 The Eggs 426

68 Monster 429

69 Lucho's Heart 435

70 Pinchao's Escape 442

71 The Death of Pinchao 450

72 The Friend Marc 456

73 The Ban 463

74 The Letters 469

75 The Separation 475

76 Stroking Death 480

77 Thied Proof of Life 489

78 Lucho's Release 495

79 The Disagreement 504

80 The Sacred Heart 511

81 The Trick 514

82 The End of Silence 523