Imperial Life in the Emerald City: Inside Iraq's Green Zone is a 2006 book by Rajiv Chandrasekaran that takes a critical look at the civilian leadership of the American reconstruction project in Iraq. Centered mainly on the actions of the Coalition Provisional Authority, within the Green Zone of Baghdad, Chandrasekaran details the events from the end of the invasion phase of the war until the official transfer of power to the Iraqis and the growing insurgency in the country. In the prologue to the book, Chandrasekaran claims that his work does not take a side for or against the United States'... invasion of Iraq, simply treating it as a given, and instead focuses purely on examining how the post-invasion occupation was handled. The book was chosen as one of the best non-fiction books of 2006/2007 by Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times. The book also won the 2007 Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-Fiction and the 2006 Overseas Press Club of America award, and was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award 2007. The nonfiction book has been adapted into a fictional thriller written by Brian Helgeland and directed by Paul Greengrass.
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