Join us for a timely conversation with NPR journalist Emily Feng on her groundbreaking new book Our Hearts Burned for Home: Uyghur Militants in Syria’s Civil War (Columbia Global Reports, October 2026), an extraordinary work of reportage tracing one of the most surprising and consequential stories to emerge from the global war on terror.

Drawing on years of reporting across China, Central Asia, Turkey and the Middle East, Feng uncovers the little-known journey of Uyghur families and militants who fled China’s intensifying surveillance state and mass repression in Xinjiang, seeking refuge abroad. For many, escape did not bring safety. Instead, exile led them into the chaos of the Syrian Civil War, where some Uyghur militants became an unexpected and influential force in the conflict that helped reshape the region and contributed to the eventual collapse of Bashar al-Assad’s regime. Through intimate storytelling and sharp geopolitical analysis, Feng reveals how displacement, statelessness and repression can reverberate far beyond national borders.

At once deeply human and urgently political, Our Hearts Burned for Home challenges conventional narratives about extremism, migration and resistance. It asks difficult questions about belonging, radicalization and the global consequences of authoritarian rule, while centering the voices of people whose stories have too often been ignored.

Copies of Our Hearts Burned for Home will be on sale, with the author available to sign them.

Feng will be joined in conversation by New York Times journalist Michael Forsythe, and the event is presented by China Books Review, a digital magazine of reviews, essays, profiles and more — follow their newsletter for event postings and discounts.

Emily Feng is an award-winning correspondent for NPR covering China, Taiwan and beyond, reporting on everything from semiconductors to drones, environmental wastelands to girl bands. Formerly based in Beijing and Taipei, she now lives in Washington D.C. Feng is the author of Our Hearts Burned for Home (2026) and Let Only Red Flowers Bloom (2025).

Michael Forsythe is an American journalist. He is an investigative reporter for The New York Times, and was formerly Beijing correspondent for Bloomberg News in the 2010s. Forsythe is the coauthor with Henry Sanderson of China’s Superbank (2013).