Additional information
by J. Mike Olson (Author)
A thrilling story of desperation, betrayal and survival, Crossing the Tigress is a story about an Iraqi woman thrust into the horrendous circumstances created by war. In secret opposition to Saddam Hussein, yet far from trusting the coalition; Sahar is forced to either trust the Americans or support the insurgency. In her struggle to survive she comes to realize that she cannot rely on anyone but herself to keep her two daughters alive. Crossing the Tigress introduces Sahar as a high school student as she learns to cope with life under Saddam Hussein and the violence of the war between Iran and Iraq. By the time the American-led coalition invades Iraq in 2003, Sahar is married with two daughters. She works at the Ministry of Health (MOH) during the day and as a private practice dentist after hours. Disillusioned with the disappointing end of the Kuwait War and the effect of the UN sanctions on the common Iraqi population, she fears the arrival of the Americans. However, soon after they arrive, Sahar hesitantly develops a close professional relationship with Lieutenant Colonel Joe Brown, who is assigned as the Coalition Provisional Authority's (CPA) advisor to the director general of engineering for the MOH. Violence erupts all around them as the insurgency responds to the invasion and the CPA's decrees alienating the top levels of the Ba'ath party and disbanding the Iraqi Army. Torn between the pressure from Zaid, an influential Saddam loyalist and Joe, Sahar strives to find the safest path for her family. As her world spirals out of control, Sahar must fight like a tigress to protect the only things left in her life worth defending.
Author Biography
During Operation Iraqi Freedom, Lieutenant Colonel Olson was assigned to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad to work as the senior advisor to the director general of engineering of the Iraqi Ministry of Health. While there, as part of the larger MOH CPA team, he worked with a staff of forty Iraqi architects, engineers and health care providers, "Dr. Sahar" being one of them. Their main task was to establish the reconstruction program for the Iraqi healthcare system. Being a part of the effort, Mike saw how the reconstruction effort was shaped, executed and portrayed. He saw first-hand how the press tainted accuracy in their frantic race for a sensational story and how the Coalition Provisional Authority intentionally misled the public as they strived to highlight only politically beneficial sound bites. But most importantly, he saw how the impact of the war on the Iraqi people was usually glossed over and under-emphasized. Through it all, he learned that history tends to be contaminated by heavy doses of fiction. By reading other accounts and writing his own, he also learned that fiction is often heavily influenced by actual events. Crossing the Tigress, his first novel, is no different. Born in Michigan, Mike grew up delivering newspapers, swimming and running in Tucson, Arizona. He graduated from Amphitheater High School in 1981 and the College of Architecture at the University of Arizona where he was also commissioned as an Army Medical Service Corps lieutenant in 1986. He received a master's degree in Design and Environmental Analysis with a minor in Healthcare Administration from Cornell University in 1998. He and his wife, who have one child, were married in Seoul, Korea in 1989. Mike retired from the army as a lieutenant colonel in 2007 and now balances his family life with life cycle healthcare facilities issues, emergency planning and response techniques, and writing.
