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On September 10, 2001, Michelle Shephard was in Toronto reporting on a purse-snatching for The Toronto Star. It seemed like an important story at the time. But on September 11, Michelle stood in Manhattan at Ground Zero, breathing in dust from the fallen World Trade Center. Michelle didn't know it then but that moment was the beginning of a 10-year journey - a journey she's written about in a book called 'Decade of Fear'.
The horror of 9/11 created a new job description in western journalism: national security reporter. And Michelle's been called one of the best. Her beat's taken her around the world: Yemen, Somalia, Pakistan, and, more than 20 times, to Guantanamo Bay.
Along the way she's met the perpetrators of violence. But 'Decade of Fear' also tells the story of the victims of that violence - ordinary people caught up in wars and political conflicts. The book also poses some tough questions: we're safer now, but at what cost to the world? Have security policies, meant to make life better, actually made life more vulnerable? And given all the money spent and lives lost in the war on terror, is the West any better off?
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