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Cover of The Great Escape: A True Story of Forced Labor and Immigrant Dreams in America

The Great Escape: A True Story of Forced Labor and Immigrant Dreams in America

by Saket Soni

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Saket Soni’s The Great Escape begins in 2006, when Soni, a labor organizer, receives a midnight phone call from a Mississippi number. Speaking in Hindi, the caller pleads, “You need to help us, sir. We are growing desperate.” The man is one of 500 Indian welders and pipefitters who paid $20,000 to a firm that promised green cards if they would help rebuild after Hurricane Katrina. But the green cards were a lie, and the men are living in squalid work camps. What follows reads like a movie script: There’s a daring middle-of-the-night escape from camp, then a march to Washington, D.C., where the workers file a human trafficking complaint with the Department of Justice. Throughout it all, Soni humanizes the men, reminding us that exploitation is all too common among marginalized workers.

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"Saket Soni’s The Great Escape begins in 2006, when Soni, a labor organizer, receives a midnight phone call from a Mississippi number. Speaking in Hindi, the caller pleads, “You need to help us, sir. We are growing desperate.” The man is one of 500 Indian welders and pipefitters who paid $20,000 to a firm that promised green cards if they would help rebuild after Hurricane Katrina. But the green cards were a lie, and the men are living in squalid work camps. What follows reads like a movie script: There’s a daring middle-of-the-night escape from camp, then a march to Washington, D.C., where the workers file a human trafficking complaint with the Department of Justice. Throughout it all, Soni humanizes the men, reminding us that exploitation is all too common among marginalized workers."
NPR Books We Love — 2023 · apps.npr.org