Özlem Cecik reports on some of her most remarkable meetings with her abusers. She visits people with extreme attitudes towards other communities, like the ultra-right Kim, who’d happily kill his Muslim neighbours if only he had a gun. She gains entry to the Islamist Hizbut-Tahrirs mosque, where the imam preaches against democracy and homosexuality. Özlem meets the salafist Mahmut who has killed five policemen and is ready to lay down his life for Islam. Özlem meets the evangelical priest Henrik who opposes gays and whose belief in scripture is as fanatical as any imam’s. She ultimately travels to Israel and the occupied territories to witness the conflict for herself – the same conflict that plays out between Muslims and Jews across the world.

Özlem is honest about her own doubts, fears and prejudices; and she probes the origins of anger, frustration, and hate that can envelop anyone in the world today.

Ultimately, throughout the book, Özlem tries to address the questions:

• Can conversations break down prejudice and forge understanding?

• Is it naive to believe that ordinary people have nothing in common with extremists?

• And what happens when we stop talking to each other?