by Latif Yahia, Karl Wendl

isbn: 1559703733
subject: Nonfiction, Biography
finished: 6/1/2002

I was Saddam's Son has an unbeatable premise: Yahia is a natural lookalike of Hussein's son Uday, and for several years served as Uday's stunt-double, putting in public appearances at conferences, soccer games, and even visiting troops during the Gulf War. The book, however, turns out to contain little content about Yahia -- we never really learn much about what makes him tick. Rather, it paints an ugly, disturbing portrait of Iraq's ruling family and, in particular, of Uday Hussein.

I have no idea how to go about deciding how much of this book to believe. As I understand things, the broad outlines of Yahia's story are corroborated by facts, but the finer details don't always seem to hold together (and Wendl admits as much in the introduction). Furthermore, Yahia appears to have ample reason to hate the Hussein family. In any case, this is a quick, gripping read about absolute power leading to absolute corruption.