Daniel Levin was at his office when he got a call from an acquain­tance with an urgent, cryp­tic request to meet in Paris. A young man had gone miss­ing in Syr­ia. No gov­ern­ment, embassy, or intel­li­gence agency would help. Could he? Would he? So begins a sus­pense­ful, shock­ing, and at times bru­tal true sto­ry of one man’s search to find a miss­ing per­son in Syr­ia over twen­ty tense days. Levin, a lawyer turned armed-con­flict nego­tia­tor, uses his exten­sive con­tacts to chase leads through­out the Mid­dle East, meet­ing with pow­er­ful sheikhs, drug lords, and sex traf­fick­ers in his pur­suit of the truth. He also dis­cov­ers remark­able peo­ple who retain their essen­tial good­ness and spir­it in the face of adversity.

Proof of Life is a fast-paced thriller wrapped in a mem­oir, a must-read for any­one inter­est­ed in pow­er dynam­ics, inter­na­tion­al affairs, the Mid­dle East, or our grow­ing num­ber of for­ev­er wars.