Spellbinding and Riveting!!!!

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	• ELEVEN DAYS OF HELL: MY TRUE STORY OF KIDNAPPING, TERROR, TORTURE AND HISTORIC FBI & KGB RESCUE YVONNE BORNSTEIN AuthorHouse, 2004 - 364 pages average customer review:based on 26 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

A GREAT BOOK

A Fantastic book. I highly recommend that you read it. It was interesting and I learnt a lot.

Monica.

Holds the reader captive

In a popular Hollywood movie, one of the characters, playing a tough businessman who fancied himself a master of negotiating, expressed the opinion that in a business deal, there is no difference between a gun and a fountain pen. To believe that this is true is to believe that the use of force or violence to obtain monetary reward is equivalent to using artful negotiation, rational persuasion, or skillful selling. Coercion then becomes just another technique for the acquisition of wealth, and individuals in the business community who refrain from using it are to be viewed as "unrealistic" or even weak-minded. Strength of character therefore has its origins in a willingness to intimidate physically other people in order to bring about a desired end. Real business involves "doing whatever it takes" to increase wealth, even if this means causing extreme pain or even death.

There are many who believe in this equivalence, but thankfully there are many who do not. As the events of her life and skill in entrepreneurship indicate, the author of this book is a member of the latter category, and in this book has written an engaging (and terrifying) story of how she and her business partner/husband were forced to deal with some individuals of the former category. Kidnapped for eleven days, where they were beaten and intimidated by a collection of moronic and confused thugs, who could not distinguish the acquisition of wealth from its plundering, and who sadistically enjoyed the pain they gave their captives, the couple nevertheless got away with their lives, with the assistance of a unexpected collaboration between East and West.

For those, such as this reviewer, who are extremely skeptical of the competence of governmental security personnel, and of their abilities to cooperate constructively with foreign governments, this story will alleviate some of this skepticism (although the author describes the FBI as being reluctant to get involved). There are not too many things that are more frightening than the prospect of being caught in a foreign country where the laws and sense of justice are different, and where envy towards Westerners is predominant. And if one does find oneself in such a situation and does survive it, the natural thing to do it seems would be to obliterate it from memory. Reminders of it would be draining, both emotionally and intellectually, and would serve no useful purpose in everyday living.

The author though has chosen to tell her story, and has written one that is fast moving but still gives insight into her moods as well as her captors. It focuses of course on the concrete details of her captivity, but also motivates the reader to consider why her captors behaved as they did, and whether the wealth that they expected to obtain was really worth the energy they expended to get it. It is always perplexing to see a group of individuals conniving, planning, and engaging in violent acts, and expending vast amounts of energy just to obtain by relative standards a paltry sum of money. Considerably less energy is needed to obtain the same sum by legal and creative means, but for some reason these types of individuals cannot see this. The answer must be that they love the intimidation and sense of power that violence gives them. The neurons in their brains are over trained by sadism, polluted with cynicism, and allow no expression of compassion or empathy. The money they obtain is spent in no time flat, on fruitless physical indulgences or one meaningless card game after another. They idolize and prop each other up, with their handshakes and backslaps, and any real sense of achievement is completely alien to them. Taking is always better then earning. They unite under the creed that "only suckers work."

Interestingly, when the author discusses her emotional state with respect to her captors, she mentions the "Stockholm syndrome." This is supposed to be a kind of brainwashing that causes the captive to express sympathy for or even admiration for the captor. On the surface this does not seem too surprising, since when in a situation of dependence one's emotional processes are completely out of equilibrium, with a consequent loss of self-esteem. It is difficult to find definitive research on the reality of the Stockholm syndrome, due no doubt to low occurrence of situations like that of the author, and lack of explicit documentation of the emotional states of the captives, before and after their confinement. Such a syndrome could explain the reason why so many abused wives tend to remain emotionally attached to their abusive husbands.

At the end of the book, the author describes her homecoming and the skepticism that she and her husband encountered by some members of the press, who did not believe her story. Their business in shambles, they did pick up and move on, although the author describes her life as being very stressful for sometime after the kidnapping. And what happened to their captors? "Whereabouts unknown" says the author. Unfortunately these creeps are still wandering around, and their behaviors have been emulated on a grander scale in the form of the Russian mob, part of which is active in the United States.

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Riveting story of survival

Yvonne Borstein and her husband Danny were kidnapped by a band of Russian gangsters and ex-KGB villians in early 1991. They were tortured physically and emotionally for a 1.6 billion dollar random (which was orders of magnitude above the liquid assets of the heavily-mortgaged Australian business-couple).

Was Yvonne an innocent tourist kidnapped in Russia? No. A do-gooder helping revive post-Iron Curtain Russia? Well, no. How about a profiteer involved with shady business deals on Russia's black market? Yep, that's it. In hindsight, Yvonne admits that she and Danny were dazzled by wealth, heavily over-mortgaged on their house, gambling by paying out millions in anticipation of high (but dubiously legal) returns, and they were unwilling to wake up to the many signs of trouble in their Russo-Australian import/export business. As a reader, I appreciated her candor and lack of excuses or assignment of blame.

Even shady entrepreneurs in economically ravaged countries don't deserve to be tortured for an insanely high ransom. Yvonne's book is the story of her entire life, from her childhood to her early troubled relationships before meeting husband Danny. Yvonne lays out the events which unraveled and lead south to the kidnapping. In captivity, Yvonne and Danny leveraged one another's strengths, plotting to get messages out to the world and to present the right "face" to their kidnappers. The couple only survived because of their union. When Yvonne was sexually assaulted, she knew she had to hide it during the captivity, to prevent her husband from violently assaulting their tormentors.

Bornstein bills her memoir as evidence of al-Qaeda alive and well in early 1990's Russia. This is certainly a good advertisement in the post-9/11 world, but it is a shaky claim at best. Sure, there is evidence of al-Qaeda, but don't pick this up expecting some all-conclusive smoking gun expose on Afghan terrorism.

Yvonne is a survivor and as inspiration to women everywhere. She dug up a lot of information to provide context to her own personal (and painful) narrative. Thanks for sharing your story, Ms. Bornstein!

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Spellbinding and Riveting!!!!

I have great admiration for Yvonne Bornstein for having lived and breathed this horrific criminal act. The people who committed this crime should be shot, drawn and quartered! No-body should have to live through this kind of horrendous ordeal.
This book has been marvellously written and should be listed on the New York bestseller list.
I read via Google that Ms Bornstein is currently negotiating her life rights with a major Hollywood studio.
Out of something bad comes something good.
I truly hope that Yvonne succeeds in her venture, she really deserves it.

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Suspenceful and dramatic

This is a true story of "man's inhumanity to man" and a wake up call for those living in the television provided security of their living rooms. One cannot accuse Yvonne of of any zest for growing roots into the sofa, au contraire. However, the dangers she encounters go far beyond anything she ever imagined. Russia's organized crime proves too tough, too well organized, and too cruel, when Yvonne and her former husband, Danny Wienstock, are kidnapped by predatory thugs. This terrifying account of the torture and dramatic rescue is recounted in vivid detail Bornstein's suspenseful tale, ELEVEN DAYS OF HELL.

Yvonne's testimony drives home the fact that the events taking place in Russia affect everyone ... it's a small world we live in today. This is a read that tears at the nerves; Bornstein paints a lucid picture of the events of her and her husband's captivity in the town of Noginsk, involving horrible mental and physical abuses heaped on them. Fortunately, back at the ranch some good guys still work at the CIA, and they manage to unite forces with Russian and Australian authorities. The two stories are entwined in a way that builds tension nicely to a thrilling rescue, yet this is not the end. Yvonne must now grapple with the internal demons unleashed by her tormentors. The made for TV drama may be over, but, in the aftermath, her real battle has only just begun.

For anyone who wishes a peak into the horrors and mind set created by events that few of us have or will ever experience, this book is a must read. That said, those who have already experienced "man's inhumanity to man" may have a difficult time getting through the disturbing sequence of events. On the other hand, other victims of violence may be reasssured that justice does exist in the world, and it is sometimes served to the thugs who deserve it.

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

On January 6, 1992 Yvonne Weinstock and her then-husband Danny landed in Moscow on a business trip. They had just left the airport when they were ambushed, kidnapped and held for ransom for 11 horrifying days in a dilapidated country house by a gang of Russian "gypsies" who were in reality far more sinister -- cold-blooded conspirators in a sinister plot that joined the Russian Mob, ex-KGB agents and early al-Qaeda operatives looking to fund terrorism, no matter the cost of human life. As told by Yvonne Weinstock (now Bornstein), who survived, but will never be free of its painful echoes, this is the incredible story of those 11 days of hell, and of one of history's unlikeliest rescue operations -- which against all odds allied the FBI and Russian intelligence agencies for the first and only time in history. Reliving the agony, horror and torture she endured, she also unravels the twists and turns of the rescue mission from her own research into the confidential case, skillfully weaving a heart-thumping narrative of drama and intrigue worthy of a top-notch spy novel. Yvonne writes from the heart about the devastating impact of the kidnapping on her marriage and her life, and the change of attitude it had on her that resulted in a belated appreciation for the simple, meaningful things she had come to overlook in her drive to the top of the corporate business world.. In the end, though, she lives uneasily with the memory of her 11 days of hell, she took from it lessons in life that apply to all of us.

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