How to Feed a Dictator: Saddam Hussein, IDI Amin, Enver Hoxha, Fidel Castro, and Pol Pot Through the Eyes of Their Cooks

"Amazing stories . . . Intimate portraits of how these five ruthless leaders] were at home and at the table." --Lulu Garcia-Navarro, NPR's Weekend Edition Sunday

Anthony Bourdain meets Kapuściński in this chilling look from within the kitchen at the appetites of five of the twentieth century's most infamous dictators, by the acclaimed author of Dancing Bears.

What was Pol Pot eating while two million Cambodians were dying of hunger? Did Idi Amin really eat human flesh? And why was Fidel Castro obsessed with one particular cow?

Traveling across four continents, from the ruins of Iraq to the savannahs of Kenya, Witold Szablowski tracked down the personal chefs of five dictators known for the oppression and massacre of their own citizens--Iraq's Saddam Hussein, Uganda's Idi Amin, Albania's Enver Hoxha, Cuba's Fidel Castro, and Cambodia's Pol Pot--and listened to their stories over sweet-and-sour soup, goat-meat pilaf, bottles of rum, and games of gin rummy. Dishy, deliciously readable, and dead serious, How to Feed a Dictator provides a knife's-edge view of life under tyranny.

Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: Penguin Group
Published: 04/28/2020
ISBN: 9780143129752
Pages: 288
Weight: 0.45lbs
Size: 7.70h x 5.10w x 0.80d

Review Citations: Publishers Weekly 01/13/2020
Kirkus Reviews 02/01/2020
Booklist 03/01/2020 pg. 7