By Khaled Hosseini
Oh, oh, oh...such a brief story, but so powerful in its impact.
A father holds his son as they await the arrival of a boat that will take them away. He shares with his son the familiar sounds and sights from their home outside the city of Homs, things his son will be too young to remember: olive trees in the breeze, the bleating of goats, the clanging of his grandmother's cooking pots... In the bustling old city "a mosque for us Muslims, a church for our Christian neighbors..." But then... protests and siege, bombs, starvation, burials. The father prays as they set out from the despair of their war-torn country, hoping for a better land ahead, and that the sea will keep them safe.
The author of the moving Kite Runner and One Thousand Splendid Suns has written this beautiful prayer. Hosseini was inspired by the death of little Alan Kurdi, whose family was fleeing Syria and hoping to reach Europe. Their inflatable boat had capsized off the coast of Turkey and the little boy's body washed up on a Mediterranean beach. A Turkish journalist photographed the little boy, and the picture quickly made its way around the world, creating interest and compassion, at least for a time, for the plight of refugees, especially children.
This book is poignantly illustrated by Dan Williams: the Syrian fields, the bustling old city, the destruction, the despair, the love.
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