{"product_id":"the-book-collectors-of-daraya-a-band-of-syrian-rebels-their-underground-library-and-the-stories-that-carried-them-through-a-war","title":"The Book Collectors of Daraya","description":"Award-winning journalist Delphine Minoui recounts the true story of a band of young rebels in a besieged Syrian town, who find hope and connection making an underground library from the rubble of war. Day in, day out, bombs fall on Daraya, a town outside Damascus, the very spot where the Syrian Civil War began. In the midst of chaos and bloodshed, a group searching for survivors stumbles on a cache of books. They collect the books, then look for more. In a week they have six thousand volumes. In a month, fifteen thousand. A sanctuary is born: a library where the people of Daraya can explore beyond the blockade. Long a site of peaceful resistance to the Assad regimes, Daraya was under siege for four years. No one entered or left, and international aid was blocked. In 2015, French-Iranian journalist Delphine Minoui saw a post on Facebook about this secret library and tracked down one of its founders, twenty-three-year-old Ahmad, an aspiring photojournalist himself. Over WhatsApp and Facebook, Minoui learned about the young men who gathered in the library, exchanged ideas, learned English, and imagined how to shape the future, even as bombs fell above. They devoured a marvelous range of books—from American self-help like The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People to international bestsellers like The Alchemist, from Arabic poetry by Mahm","brand":"Thryft Singapore","offers":[{"title":"Like New","offer_id":51134594449689,"sku":"X56405","price":6.9,"currency_code":"SGD","in_stock":false},{"title":"Very Good","offer_id":51134594482457,"sku":"X56405","price":5.9,"currency_code":"SGD","in_stock":false},{"title":"Good","offer_id":51134594515225,"sku":"X56405","price":4.9,"currency_code":"SGD","in_stock":false},{"title":"Well Read","offer_id":51134594547993,"sku":"X56405","price":4.9,"currency_code":"SGD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0110\/0598\/4849\/files\/60544744.jpg?v=1754571072","url":"https:\/\/thryft.sbs\/products\/the-book-collectors-of-daraya-a-band-of-syrian-rebels-their-underground-library-and-the-stories-that-carried-them-through-a-war","provider":"Thryft","version":"1.0","type":"link"}