This is NPR's Book of the Day. I'm Kia Miakana Tis. In the years following the historically

devastating Hurricane Katrina, there was so much damage to repair in the Gulf of Mexico,

including oil rigs. It's increasingly common for migrant workers to help rebuild after climate disasters, and back then, in 2006, scores of men from India paid great sums to travel to the U.S. to help repair these rigs. In exchange, they were promised green cards. But it was a trap. Instead, they were essentially held hostage under guard and behind barbed wire in labor camps,

surviving on meals of frozen rice and working around the clock.

A new book, The Great Escape, tells the story of these labor hostages and the man who helped them escape, author Socket Soni.

Here he is with Here Now's Deepa Fernandez.

In the U.S., national security news can feel far away from daily life.

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In 2006, Sarkat Sonny was a labor organizer working in New Orleans when he received a phone call from a stranger in Mississippi

desperate for help. The caller was an Indian migrant worker who had been lured to the US by a company

called Signal International to repair oil rigs damaged by Hurricane Katrina. In a meeting at a local

church and in gatherings afterwards, Sarket learned that

there were hundreds of men living in what Signal called man camps under appalling conditions.

They believed they were working towards green cards, but in reality, the men were temporary workers

whose signal could send home at any time. Eventually, Sarkat helped the men were temporary workers whose Signal could send home at any time.

Eventually, Sarkat helped the men escape and led them on a march to Washington, D.C., to publicize

their plight and helped them stay in the U.S., but all along the way they were shadowed by agents

of ICE and continually being discredited by Signal.

Sakatsoni writes about their journey in his new book, The Great Escape, and he joins us now. Welcome, Sarkit. Great to be here. So Sarket, I met you

in the years after Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana, where you were organizing and I was reporting.

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