William Serle

Stealing Ali: Based on a True Story William Serle

A child is taken to remote village in Lebanon by her biological father. He leaves her there as an act of revenge. The action sweeps through Miami, New York, Beirut, Bahrain, Sharjah and Abu Dhabi as the characters act out dramas as old as the human family. Kidnapping, jealousy, revenge, stealth and violent behavior engulf them all. Ali was four when her Cuban mother, Maggie, and her Lebanese father, Joe Zayyat got divorced in Miami. Maggie remarried. Joe took Ali to Lebanon to meet his family while Maggie honeymooned with her new husband, Lee. Joe, in a spiteful rage, told his daughter that her mother didn?t want her anymore and he left her in Lebanon to be put in a boarding school until he could convince Maggie to leave Lee. This was an emotionally devastating blow. Maggie journeyed alone to Lebanon to retrieve her daughter. Ali?s hair was cut short, she was taking Valium and thought her mother didn?t love her. Maggie succeeded in retrieving Ali but despicable Joe Zayyat, kidnapped her again. Maggie and Lee became detectives and learned that Joe and Ali were in Bahrain - an island emirate they?d never heard of. They went there and stole her back. Lawyers and judges took control. Catholic Joe, converted to Islam to win legal custody in Bahrain?s Sharia court. Overcoming betrayal by the U. S. Embassy and a hostile attitude toward women, Maggie and Lee escaped from Bahrain with Ali. They traveled through the Middle East without passports and faced stern interrogations by Arabic police and immigration officials. They risked everything in a struggle to bring Ali home.