The United Nations has designated June 20th as World Refugee Day. This is a day to show public support for refugees around the world. In honor of World Refugee Day, here are some moving true stories of refugees. Walk a mile in a refugee's shoes by reading about them.
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One goal : a coach, a team, and the game that brought a divided town together
by Amy Bass An Emmy Award-winning writer and professor of history traces the uplifting story of the Lewiston, Maine champion high school soccer team and how it helped bridge cultural divides between longtime residents and the Somali refugees who were scandalously asked to stop resettling in the community. |
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Stormy seas : stories of young boat refugees
by Mary Beth Leatherdale A treacherous voyage across the open seas becomes the last hope for safety and freedom for five young refugees from different world regions, in a collection of true accounts that are complemented by collage artwork, sidebars, fact boxes and timelines. |
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Hara Hotel : A Tale of Syrian Refugees in Greece
by Teresa Thornhill Hara Hotel chronicles everyday life in a makeshift refugee camp on the forecourt of a petrol station in northern Greece. In the first two months of 2016, more than 100,000 refugees arrived in Greece. Half of them were fleeing war-torn Syria, seeking a safe haven in Europe. As the numbers seeking refuge soared, many were stranded in temporary camps, staffed by volunteers. Hara Hotel tells some of their stories. |
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How dare the sun rise : memoirs of a war child
by Sandra Uwiringiyimana A memoir by the co-creator of the Foundation of Hope Ministries shares the remarkable story of her survival during the Gatumba massacre and how after moving to America she found healing through art and activism. |
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The Land Between Two Rivers : Writing in an Age of Refugees
by Tom Sleigh These essays recount Tom Sleigh's experiences working as a journalist during several tours in Africa and in the Middle Eastern region once called Mesopotamia, "the land between two rivers. |
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My American dream : a life of love, family, and food
by Lidia Bastianich The Emmy Award-winning host of Lidia's Kitchen and best-selling author of Lidia's Celebrate Like an Italian shares a heartwarming, revelatory memoir that traces her impoverished but loving upbringing under Tito's communist regime, her years as a refugee while trying to enter the United States and her early start as a restaurant worker. |
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The best we could do : an illustrated memoir
by Thi Bui The author describes her experiences as a young Vietnamese immigrant, highlighting her family's move from their war-torn home to the United States in graphic novel format. |
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The Fox Hunt : A Refugee's Memoir of Coming to America
by Mohammed Al Samawi The son of middle-class Shiite doctors in Yemen shares his moving story of love, war and hope that describes his harrowing escape from regional fanaticism and civil unrest through a daring plan engineered on social media by a small group of Western interfaith activists. |
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Integration nation : immigrants, refugees, and America at its best
by Susan E. Eaton A research director at the Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice at Harvard Law School travels across the U.S. and interviews people who, contrary to increased xenophobia, are welcoming and working with immigrants, helping them to integrate and adjust culturally. |
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Tears of salt : a doctor's story
by Pietro Bartolo Pietro Bartolo, the doctor of the lone medical clinic on the Italian island of Lampedusa, chronicles his efforts to rescue, welcome and care for many of the hundreds of thousands of desperate migrants from the Middle East and Africa who have washed up on the island’s shores. |
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Rescue Board : the untold story of America's efforts to save the Jews of Europe
by Rebecca Erbelding A U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum scholar responds to criticism of America for its alleged refusal to give harbor to Jewish victims of Nazism, tracing the extraordinary story of the War Refugee Board and FDR's lesser-known, last-ditch effort to save Europe's Jewish survivors. |
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Among the living and the dead : a tale of exile and homecoming on the war roads of Europe
by Inara Verzemnieks Journeying back to the remote Latvian village where her family broke apart, the author comes to know her grandmother's sister, Ausma, and the trauma of her exile to Siberia under Stalin, while reconstructing her grandmother Livija’s survival through her years as a refugee. |
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The far away brothers : two young migrants and the making of an American life
by Lauren Markham An urgent chronicle of contemporary immigration follows the harrowing journey of a pair of teenaged twins from El Salvador who were forced by gang violence to see safety and a better life in the United States, an endeavor marked by family estrangement, a mounting coyote debt and America's complicated immigration policies. |
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Under the same sky : from starvation in North Korea to salvation in America
by Joseph Kim A man who escaped the devastating famine in North Korea, despite being abandoned as a boy, tells the story of his survival inside the oppressive country, his escape and subsequent rescue by activists and Christian missionaries and his success in the United States thanks to a newfound faith and courage. |
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Outcasts united : the story of a refugee soccer team that changed a town
by Warren St. John Shares the inspirational story of a youth soccer team comprised of refugees from around the world who, under the guidance of a formidable female coach, helped to transform their Georgia community. |