Enjoy fast, free delivery, exclusive deals, and award-winning movies & TV shows with Prime
Try Prime
and start saving today with fast, free delivery
Amazon Prime includes:
Fast, FREE Delivery is available to Prime members. To join, select "Try Amazon Prime and start saving today with Fast, FREE Delivery" below the Add to Cart button.
Amazon Prime members enjoy:- Cardmembers earn 5% Back at Amazon.com with a Prime Credit Card.
- Unlimited Free Two-Day Delivery
- Streaming of thousands of movies and TV shows with limited ads on Prime Video.
- A Kindle book to borrow for free each month - with no due dates
- Listen to over 2 million songs and hundreds of playlists
- Unlimited photo storage with anywhere access
Important: Your credit card will NOT be charged when you start your free trial or if you cancel during the trial period. If you're happy with Amazon Prime, do nothing. At the end of the free trial, your membership will automatically upgrade to a monthly membership.
-66% $10.29$10.29
Ships from: Amazon Sold by: Knupp Co.
$7.54$7.54
Ships from: Amazon Sold by: Martistore
Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.
Read instantly on your browser with Kindle for Web.
Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.
OK
Audible sample Sample
I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban Hardcover – Abridged, October 8, 2013
Purchase options and add-ons
As seen on Netflix with David Letterman
"I come from a country that was created at midnight. When I almost died it was just after midday."
When the Taliban took control of the Swat Valley in Pakistan, one girl spoke out. Malala Yousafzai refused to be silenced and fought for her right to an education.
On Tuesday, October 9, 2012, when she was fifteen, she almost paid the ultimate price. She was shot in the head at point-blank range while riding the bus home from school, and few expected her to survive.
Instead, Malala's miraculous recovery has taken her on an extraordinary journey from a remote valley in northern Pakistan to the halls of the United Nations in New York. At sixteen, she became a global symbol of peaceful protest and the youngest nominee ever for the Nobel Peace Prize.
I AM MALALA is the remarkable tale of a family uprooted by global terrorism, of the fight for girls' education, of a father who, himself a school owner, championed and encouraged his daughter to write and attend school, and of brave parents who have a fierce love for their daughter in a society that prizes sons.
I AM MALALA will make you believe in the power of one person's voice to inspire change in the world.
- Print length327 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherLittle, Brown and Company
- Publication dateOctober 8, 2013
- Dimensions6.5 x 1.25 x 9.75 inches
- ISBN-100316322407
- ISBN-13978-0316322409
- Lexile measure1000L
The Amazon Book Review
Book recommendations, author interviews, editors' picks, and more. Read it now.
Frequently bought together
Similar items that may deliver to you quickly
- I was a girl in a land where rifles are fired in celebration of a son, while daughters are hidden away behind a curtain, their role in life simply to prepare food and give birth to children.Highlighted by 4,012 Kindle readers
- I was named after Malalai of Maiwand, the greatest heroine of Afghanistan.Highlighted by 3,107 Kindle readers
- When someone takes away your pens you realize quite how important education is.Highlighted by 2,390 Kindle readers
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
A Look Inside I Am Malala
Girls attending Malala’s school in Pakistan. The Headmistress of Malala’s school. The seat that Malala sat in. A beautiful view of the Swat valley, where Malala is from.Review
"Ms. Yousafzai has single-handedly turned the issue of the right of girls--and all children--to be educated into headline news. And she is a figure worth hearing." (Isabel Berwick, Financial Times)
"Wise beyond her years...." (Annie Gowen, Marie Claire)
"Riveting.... Co-written with Christina Lamb, a veteran British journalist who has an evident passion for Pakistan and can render its complicated history with pristine clarity, this is a book that should be read not only for its vivid drama but for its urgent message about the untapped power of girls.... It is difficult to imagine a chronicle of a war more moving, apart from perhaps the diary of Anne Frank. With the essential difference that we lost that girl, and by some miracle, we still have this one." (Marie Arana, Washington Post)
"Remarkable...a must-read, first-person account of her journey through global terrorism, her brave, encouraging parents, and her own fight for girls' education." (MarieClaire.com)
"The victory of Malala Yousafzai is that she's just getting started." (Mary Elizabeth Williams, Salon)
"Briskly written but full of arresting detail.... Striking [and] surprising..." (Jill Lawless, Associated Press)
"Ms. Yousafzai's stature as a symbol of peace and bravery has been established across the world..." (Salman Masood, The New York Times)
"Not only has Malala Yousafzai become an international symbol of inspiration and bravery, but her survival instilled educators with courage-and is slowly helping make Pakistani schools safer." (Nick Schifrin, ABC.com)
"For a teenage girl in a distant corner of the globe to spark life into this movement-against overwhelming odds-is truly extraordinary. The world must not allow Malala's message to die." (Dallas Morning News)
"Her powerful message remains undiluted." (Tina Jordan, Entertainment Weekly)
"In simple, clear writing, I AM MALALA gives a rare and moving first-person glance into what it's like to be a teenager in a country seized by extremists who stand against the basic freedoms you believe in." (Krystin Arneson, Bustle)
About the Author
In October 2012, Malala was targeted by the Taliban and shot in the head as she was returning from school on a bus. She miraculously survived and continues her campaign for education.
In recognition of her courage and advocacy, Malala was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2014, becoming the youngest-ever recipient at just seventeen years of age. She was also honored with the National Youth Peace Prize in Pakistan in 2011 and the International Children's Peace Prize in 2013, and she was short-listed for Time magazine's Person of the Year.
Malala continues to champion universal access to education through the Malala Fund, a non-
profit organization investing in community-led programs and supporting education advocates around the world.
Christina Lamb is one of the world's leading foreign correspondents. She has reported on Pakistan and Afghanistan since 1987. Educated at Oxford and Harvard, she is the author of five books and has won a number of awards, including Britain's Foreign Correspondent of the Year five times, as well as the Prix Bayeux-Calvados, Europe's most prestigious award for war correspondents. She currently works for the Sunday Times and lives in London and Portugal with her husband and son.
Product details
- Publisher : Little, Brown and Company; First Edition (October 8, 2013)
- Language : English
- Hardcover : 327 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0316322407
- ISBN-13 : 978-0316322409
- Lexile measure : 1000L
- Item Weight : 1.31 pounds
- Dimensions : 6.5 x 1.25 x 9.75 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #81,207 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #67 in Social Activist Biographies
- #1,052 in Women's Biographies
- #3,038 in Memoirs (Books)
- Customer Reviews:
About the authors
Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read author blogs and more
Malala Yousafzai S.St (Malālah Yūsafzay: Urdu: ملالہ یوسفزئی; Pashto: ملاله یوسفزۍ [məˈlaːlə jusəf ˈzəj]; born 12 July 1997) is a Pakistani activist for female education and the youngest-ever Nobel Prize laureate. She is known mainly for human rights advocacy for education and for women in her native Swat Valley in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of northwest Pakistan, where the local Taliban had at times banned girls from attending school. Yousafzai's advocacy has since grown into an international movement.
Bio from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Photo by Russell Watkins/Department for International Development. (https://www.flickr.com/photos/dfid/14714344864/) [OGL (http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/1/) or CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons.
Customer reviews
Customer Reviews, including Product Star Ratings help customers to learn more about the product and decide whether it is the right product for them.
To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. Instead, our system considers things like how recent a review is and if the reviewer bought the item on Amazon. It also analyzed reviews to verify trustworthiness.
Learn more how customers reviews work on AmazonReviews with images
-
Top reviews
Top reviews from the United States
There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.
I recognize that there are great men living among us, but sometimes it take an epic event for their presence to be known outside their limited geography. Rarely do men take the lead in fighting for women’s rights. But in this book you will read about a man who has been fighting for women’s rights for his entire life. That man’s name is Ziauddin Yousafzai. Ziauddin is the Pakistani father of the very famous Malala Yousafzai, the heroine of this book. Malala is the courageous young woman who stood up for the education of girls in Pakistan. As a result, Malala was shot in the head by a member of the Taliban.
Malala is an exceptionally brave young woman. But, her father was more brave. There could have been no Malala without Ziauddin, a man of astounding courage who has fought for his entire life for the education of all children in Pakistan, boys and girls. When Malala was born, no one in the family was happy because she was a baby girl. But Ziauddin stunned all by not only being happy about his daughter’s birth, but was extremely vocal about his pride to be the father of a daughter. He insisted that his daughter be included in the family tree, much to the horror of other family members. (Sadly, in most of the Muslim world, when daughters are born, everyone goes quiet with grief. When sons are born, celebrations go on for days.)
And so from the beginning of her life, Ziauddin’s daughter was lavished with love, attention, and books. From the moment she reached the age of understanding, she knew that her father “had her back” and he would fight to the death to ensure that she, a mere girl in other’s eyes, would be treated equally with her two brothers. And so Malala grew into her teenage years feeling confident that she had the right to speak her mind, to study, to learn, and to have and pursue dreams. Ziauddin had taught his daughter how to struggle against injustice. And Malala learned how powerful a person can be who speaks out against injustice. Every child born deserves such a life. Malala's confidence in breathtaking in a country where most women are afraid to speak their mind about anything, at least outside the four walls of their homes.
When reading this book, I adored Malala, and I marveled at Ziauddin. He grew up at a time when women’s feelings were not even considered, yet he respected women, and was proud to express his respect for females, insisting that his school be open to girls, too.
Ziauddin is not only passionate and confident with his beliefs, but he is exceptionally wise about many aspects of life. Here are just a few tidbits in the book shared by Malala: “My father also loved to write poetry, sometimes about love, but often on controversial themes such as honor killings and women’s rights.”
When a Mullah in their village started a campaign against Ziauddin’s school, open to girls and boys, Ziauddin was not afraid to fight back, telling others, ’Nim Mullah khatrai iman’ or, “A Mullah who is not fully learned is a danger to faith.” (After living in the Muslim world for many years, I KNOW that it takes extraordinary courage for anyone to speak out against a Mullah. Even powerful kings and dictators chose their words with care when addressing or discussing a Mullah!)
When a doctor’s clinic was closed by the Taliban, the doctor approached Ziauddin for advice after the Taliban later offered to reopen the hospital. Ziauddin advised his friend, “Don’t accept good things from bad people.” He didn’t believe that a hospital protected by the Taliban was a good thing. He was right, and not afraid to speak out against the brutal Taliban.
When the Taliban first came to their valley (SWAT) many people welcomed them with open arms, much to Ziauddin’s dismay, for he knew they were wolves in sheep’s clothing. Later after the Taliban completely took over and began to murder many people, everyone was forced to flee. When they returned to their village, they found a letter from a Pakistani soldier condemning the villagers for allowing the Taliban to gain control Swat. Ziauddin told his daughter, “This is typical. We people of Swat were first seduced by the Taliban, then killed by them and now blamed for them. Seduced, killed and blamed.” In fact, Ziauddin was being generous. He was never seduced. In fact, he fought against the Taliban from the first day until the last.
When Ziauddin received death threats from the Taliban, he refused to give up his activities to educate children or to stop warning his friends against cooperating with the Taliban. Even after his friends were shot in the face by the Taliban, he kept on course. Everyone believed that Ziauddin would be next.
But it was his bold and courageous daughter who was shot.
After the attempted murder of Malala, we learn from Malala that her father "…argued that all he had ever wanted was to create a school in which children could learn….” “My only ambition,” Ziauddin said, is to educate my children and my nation as much as I am able. But when half of your leaders tell lies and the other half negotiating with the Taliban, there is nowhere to go. One has to speak out.”
Although Ziauddin was unusually courageous, he was often frustrated, once saying, “I have a school, but I am neither a khan nor a political leader. I have no platform. I am only one small man.”
I beg to differ: Ziauddin, you are NOT a small man. You are a lion of a man, the greatest of men, one of the most courageous men I’ve ever had the pleasure to read about — a man unafraid to go against entrenched ideas and prejudices fully embraced by your society.
When Mala’s mother continued to believe that women should not go out of the house, and should not speak to any man not of her family, Ziauddin told his wife: “Pekai, purdah is not only in the veil, purdah is in the heart.”
Ziauddin kept a famous poem (written by Martin Niemoller, who lived in Nazi Germany) in his pocket:
First they came for the communists,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a communist.
Then they came for the socialists,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a socialist.
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn’t speak out because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the Catholics,
and I didn’t speak out because I was not a Catholic.
Then they came for me,
and there was no one left to speak for me.
I have discovered that it is very difficult to bring positive kind of change to our world. And, as hard as women might fight against abuses, we cannot bring this kind of massive social change until men stand by our side. If only every thinking men would come forward like Ziauddin Yousafzai to fight for women’s rights. If only every man would live as Ziauddin Yousafzi has lived, soon we could defeat the abuses man inflicts upon women.
Ziauddin Yousafzi is a modest man, calling himself a “small man,” but in fact he is one of the greatest men ever to walk this earth. I am sure that his daughter Malala will agree with me. Because of her father, she embraces the world with a strong spirit and great intelligence.
Malala is receiving the praise and support that se deserves. Let's not forget her father, the man who made a girl named Malala possible. We should all nominate Ziauddin Yousafzi for next year’s Nobel peace prize, and for the TIMES man of the year. We need to hold him up as the kind of hero young boys should emulate. We need many more men like Malala's father.
Ziauddin Yousafzi is a real man.
I loved history in grade school, but am embarrassed with how little history I actually know as an adult. My history knowledge is limited to a few memories from grade school decades ago, and the occasional documentary. I did not know, for example, that Pakistan was such a young country. I was surprised to learn that they won their Independence on 14 August 1947, and continued to learn more about Pakistan, Islam, the middle east, the Taliban, and the history of the War on Terror as told from the Middle East while reading this book.
I read the 1-star reviews, and most of them call the book boring, or are upset that it has so much history and not enough about the shooting. People have a right to their opinions, but what they disliked about this book, I enjoyed the most. Reading this was a window into a world apart, and a life of real fear and terror. If you just want the gory details of the shooting then perhaps a blog post or magazine article is more your speed, but if you're actually interested in the events in Pakistan and Swat Valley that lead up to the event, this is an amazing book that builds up brick by brick to the event we all already knew when first opening the book. This book isn't about how Malala got shot, it is about WHY Malala got shot.
Malala paints an amazing picture of the beauty of Swat Valley in Pakistan, her home, and of her culture, her people, her friends and her family. It wasn't at all what I expected. Before reading this book when I pictured anywhere in the middle east I pictured endless deserts with caves full of terrorists, and dusty villages of mud hits full of filth and disease and mangy dogs and wandering goats and 100-year-old cars rusting in rubble heaps. I never once pictured lush green valleys, snow capped mountains, wildflowers, and rivers.
Malala's story is beautiful, touching, humbling, and every bit as heroic as people say. She and her father are amazing human beings that the world could use many more of. But it was the window into the life, society and culture of Pakistan that kept me turning the pages of this book. I found myself pausing only long enough to google something I wanted to know more about, or flipping to the glossary in the back to remind myself what something meant. It also made me realize how very much I take for granted. I would have given anything to not have to go to school most days, and here is a girl that fought tooth and nail to get what I got without a second thought.
It was interesting, and sad, to learn the history of the rise of the radical Islamic terrorism that would lead to the events of 9/11 and after that to the shooting of Malala, and it was fascinating to read about some bits of Islam that disagrees with radicalism. Too many people think that all Muslims are evil, woman-hating terrorists, but just learning about Malala and especially her father is proof that isn't true. So many people forget that the first countries the Taliban brought their terror to were their own. Afghanistan, and Pakistan, suffered years of fear, persecution and terror before it spread to effect us in the West.
This book is a fascinating window into that world by letting us experience life from Malala's perspective. We see her (and her father's) bravery as they stand up for what they believe in, as they strive to bring education to women, as they risk their lives and their very safety doing what they believe is right, suffering horrific consequences, and yet never backing down, and never giving in. Malala is 15 years younger than me (she is 21 now), but after reading this book I consider her one of my idols, and I will strive to be as brave, compassionate, selfess, helpful and hopeful as she is. I think we could all strive to be a bit more like Malala.
I highly recommend this book, and it has earned a permanent place on my shelf.
Top reviews from other countries
E
Malala is also an amazing women and I am so happy I discovered her story.