I Must Betray You offers a dramatic window into the repressive nightmare that was the Romanian dictatorship of Nicolae Ceaușescu. Set in late 1989, the novel follows the story of Christian, a seventeen-year-old student in Bucharest.
The plot seamlessly introduces us to how the web of government informers and surveillance warped every aspect of life—school, family, friendships, romance, groceries, jobs, health, prisons, punishment, and protests.
A neighbor of mine who was in eighth grade in Romania when the revolution occurred, told me that this book was eerily like the life he led–food shortages, government-sponsored violence, fear of informers everywhere, restrictions on travel, jobs, and education. Like Christian in the novel, my neighbor even marched with the protestors while army soldiers with loaded weapons watched.
Some people in this country say our government is so bad it would be better to throw it away and start over. After all, things couldn’t get any worse. If we are tempted this Independence Day to think that we live in bad times, this story reminds us to be grateful for what we have—for things could be worse, much worse.
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Image by Larry White from Pixabay
