Book Review: The Refugee Diaries
Book Review: The Refugee Diaries
The Refugee Diaries is a series of children’s books that tell the true stories of children asylum seekers. Written by Anthony Robinson and illustrated by June Allan, the books are narrated through children’s own voices and tell the stories of their journeys to the UK.
Hamzat’s journey provides a simple yet harrowing account of day-to-day life for an eight year old boy in war-torn Chechnya. After Hamzat steps on a landmine and loses a foot, a charity sponsors his journey to the UK to get a prosthetic. Despite his suffering, Hazmat’s story is one of resilience and courage. Describing his journey, he says, “…in a funny way, being unlucky has been lucky in the end for me and my family”.
Meltem is a Kurdish girl whose family owned a pistachio farm in Turkey. Her moving account reveals the trauma that children experience whilst seeking asylum in the UK. Her words provide a vivid description of detention: “Yarls Wood was frightening, We had to go through twenty doors to get to where we slept. Keys and doors. Clank. It was a prison.” After periods of depression and attempts to deport her and her mother, Meltem’s story ends happily: “I just want to have a life. I want to stay in this country. That’s what I want and now I can. It’s wonderful’.
When asked about his motivation for the books, Robinson said, “We want to help children and their parents understand what it’s like to suffer the sort of turmoil that leads people to flee their homes and seek refuge in another country. Our hope is that through these individual stories of real children, ‘refugees’ and ‘asylum seekers’ will become real people with whom other children can empathise.”
The Refugee Diaries are published by Frances Lincoln and are available for purchase at£11.99 each.