"Ingrid Betancourt, a senator and a presidential candidate in Colombia, grew up among diplomats, literati, and artists who congregated at her parents' elegant home in Paris, France. Her father served as Colombia's ambassador to UNESCO and her mother, a political activist, continued her work on behalf of the country's countless children whose lives were being destroyed by extreme poverty and institutional neglect. Intellectually, Ingrid was influenced by Pablo Neruda and other Latin writers like Gabriel Garcia Marquez, who frequented her parents' social circle. She studied at Ecole de Sciences Politiques de Paris, a prestigious academy in France.". "From this charmed life, Ingrid Betancourt - not yet thirty, happily married to a French diplomat, and a mother of two children - returned to her native country in the late 1980s. On what was initially just a visit, she found her country under internal siege from the drug cartels and the corrupt government that had allowed them to flourish. After seeing what had become of Colombia's democracy, she didn't feel she could leave."--BOOK JACKET.