WHAT STRANGE PARADISE

by Omar El Akkad

MINI REVIEW

What Strange Paradise is an incredibly difficult read emotionally, but one I have to recommend for its tragic portrayal of the hope we all harbor as humans and what good can come from reaching out to one another. Amir is an eight-year-old boy who has fled from Syria to Egypt with his family and suddenly finds himself on a refugee boat floating across the Mediterranean. The story of the boat ride alternates with chapters about what happens after the boat sinks and everyone washes up on shore dead, except Amir.  A young local girl befriends him and intuits that perhaps the “help” her town is offering is not what the boy needs at all. This book is a brutally honest look at an even more brutal situation told through the eyes of a boy who sees things as they are. (Lily)