Monday, January 25, 2010

ENEMIES OF THE PEOPLE : MY FAMILY'S JOURNEY TO AMERICA
by Kati Marton

They were the last independent journalists reporting from Budapest during the Cold War.
Endre Marton worked for the Associated Press and his wife, Ilona, was a correspondent with the United Press. (In actuality, he filed reports for both the AP and the UP. She was no writer, but a shrewd commentator.)
Their friends were American diplomats and they led a bourgeois life. Even as they were much admired by other colleagues, though, the Martons' anti-Communism and dangerous risks taken, daily, eventually led to their arrests.
Several decades later, Kati Marton returns to the country of her birth and discovers, through the reading of secret police files, how her parents were spied on and betrayed.
Enemies of the People is quite a page-turner. The wealth of information that she discovered about her mother and father is quite astounding. Most of what she read, Kati never even knew about. Whenever she asked her parents about their lives, they preferred not to say anything.
The book is extremely well-written and a terrific story.
Recommended.