2000-2009

"Dayna Curry and Heather Mercer tell the story of their work in Afghanistan, their love for the people they served, their arrest, trial, and imprisonment by the Taliban, and their rescue by U.S. Special Forces. The heart of the book will discuss how two middle-class American women decided to leave the comforts of home in exchange for the opportunity to serve the disadvantaged, and how their faith motivated them and sustained them through the events that followed."

Soon after September 11, the news media stepped up its coverage of Martin and Gracia Burnham, the missionary couple held hostage in the Philippine jungle by terrorists with ties to Osama bin Laden. After a year of captivity and a violent rescue that resulted in Martin's death, the world watched Gracia Burnham return home in June 2002. In this riveting personal account, Burnham tells for the very first time the real story behind the news—about their harrowing ordeal, about how it affected their relationship with each other and with God, about the terrorists who held them, about the actions of the U.S. and Philippine governments, and about how they were affected by the prayers of thousands of Christians throughout the world.

Carrie Taylor McDonnall joined the International Mission Board Service in 1999 and served in Israel, Jordan, Iraq, and other Middle Eastern countries. During that time, she met and married David McDonnall, a fellow relief worker in the Islamic world. They served together in Iraq doing humanitarian work until March 15 2004, the day an insurgent ambush killed three Americans instantly and left two struggling for life.

"Lloyd Gardner's sweeping and authoritative narrative places the Iraq War in the context of U.S. foreign policy since Vietnam, casting the conflict as a chapter in a much broader story-in sharp contrast to the host of recent accounts, which focus almost exclusively on the decisions (and deceptions) in the months leading up to the invasion."

This is the story of Condoleezza Rice-- her early years growing up in the hostile environment of Birmingham, Alabama; her rise in the ranks at Stanford University to become the university's second-in-command and an expert in Soviet and Eastern European Affairs; and finally, in 2000, her appointment as the first Black woman to serve as Secretary of State.