REVIEWED BY FRANCINE PROSE
CRITIC'S CHOICE
MEMOIR
As a girl Korn led a near-idyllic life, herding goats and traveling with her tribe in Somalia. But as she describes here, all that ended when she turned 7 and was subjected to the ritual of genital mutilation. Serious physical complications that followed the operation persisted and worsened. Korn was taken to an uncle's home in Mogadishu, then received treatment in Germany, where she eventually married a Bavarian man; the two now live with their son in Munich. Currently an activist with an international organization campaigning to end the horrors of female circumcision, Korn has authored a moving, unsentimental and informative account of the painful personal experience that inspired, and continues to fuel, her work.
