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Steve_s
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Steve_s
Post Number: 184
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, November 23, 2005 - 10:25 pm: | 
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"They Poured Fire on Us From the Sky: The True Story of Three Lost Boys from Sudan" by Alephonsion Deng, Benson Deng, and Benjamin Ajak, with Judy A. Bernstein
I just finished this book. It's an amazing story told in alternating chapters written by two brothers and a cousin -- so-called Lost Boys -- who were forced at kindergaten age to flee their villages without their parents and trek nearly a thousand miles across country with thousands of other boys. Shades of William Golding's "Lord of the Flies." It includes a map which traces the odyssey of each brother, separated at the beginning and not reunited for years. They face the constant threat of starvation, disease, injury and hardship of every conceivable type, even cruelty from the people who should be protecting them. It's heartbreaking at times.
Judy Bernstein is a teacher who was asked to be their mentor when they arrived in the States as teenagers who had lived most of their lives in refugee camps in Sudan, Ethiopia, and Kenya. When they present her with very moving written accounts of their experiences, she thinks:
"Touched by their accounts and outraged by the situation, I want the world to hear of their tragic and remarkable experiences and to know what is happening in Sudan. I begin to dream that if we can weave their stories into a tapestry and if we're granted a great stroke of luck, the resulting book might pay for some tuition and they can fulfill their dreams of getting an education."
This is from the introduction:
Once I've delivered them at their apartment with their Dockers and composition books, I return home with many more questions about the situation in Sudan. What happened to the girls? Their parents? Where did the boys walk to? And what did the refugee camp look like? The Internet provides more historical background, and I watch a Sixty Minutes segment tape I ordered.
Fourteen years ago the fundamentalist jihad of the northern government drove an estimated twenty thousand boys from their families and villages in southern Sudan. Walking barefoot without food or water, they crossed a thousand miles of lion and crocodile country, eating mud to stave off thirst and starvation. In an interview, one boy says that because he was older -- eleven at the time -- he kept the lions away from the younger ones. Wandering for years, half of them died before the others at last found sanctuary in a Kenyan refugee camp.
Ignited in 1983, Africa's longest-running war is still going on. North against south. Muslims against animists and Christians. Arabs against blacks. Huge oil reserves in southern Sudan being held by the northern Muslim government fuel the war. Race, religion, and riches. The same things people always kill each other over. With no solution in sight, 2 million blacks in the south have already died. More casualties than Angola, Bosnia, Chechnya, Kosovo, Liberia, the Persian Gulf, Sierra Leone, Somalia and Rwanda combined. Two million dead. Five million displaced and at risk. A holocaust happening today. I recall the news stories over the years of famine related to drought and war somewhere in Africa, but somehow I thought it was mostly in Ethiopia. These boys fled to Ethiopia. Who flees to Ethiopia? I read two papers a day and three weekly news magazine. Why don't I know more about this war? Bosnia was in the headlines for months, but the only thing I've read recently about Sudan was that Osama bin Laden was there for five years.
Sixty Minutes reporter Bob Simon says the boys survived because most of them were outside their villages tending herds of cattle and goats when their villages were invaded. However, their parents were killed and many of their sisters sold into slavery and taken to northern Sudan. Slavery? In our time?
Sixty Minutes concludes, "If ever there were tired, poor, huddled masses yearning to breathe free, it is these boys, and that so far a thousand of Sudan's best and brightest were coming to the U.S."
Even though the chapters alternate between authors, they flow into one another in a way that creates drama. I read it in a few days and was unable to put it down. It's a very moving book which is giving me something to think about at Thanksgiving.
Here's an NPR story on the book:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4698532 |
Libralind2
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Libralind2
Post Number: 285
Registered: 09-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, November 24, 2005 - 08:11 pm: |
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Hi Steve: Have you also read "Of Beetles & Angels" Mawi Asgedom..? It is a true story of a young boy's remarkable journey from civil war in east Africa to a refugee camp in Sudan, to a childhood on welfare in an affluent American subrub, and eventually to a full tuition scholarship at Harvard.
LiLi |
Steve_s
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Steve_s
Post Number: 185
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, November 25, 2005 - 03:29 am: |
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Hi LiLi: No, I hadn't heard of Mawi Asgedom but I searched my library's Web site and they have it. I'll check it out. It doesn't say how old he is, only that at the age of 3 he fled civil war in Ethiopia by walking with his mother and brother to a Sudanese refugee camp. In the opposite direction, in other words. Thats' interesting, thanks.
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Sudan
First Time Poster
Username: Sudan
Post Number: 1
Registered: 12-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, December 05, 2005 - 09:31 pm: |
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These are both good books. However, you may also want to check out the award winning book by Joan Hecht called "The Journey of the Lost Boys"- A story of courage faith and the sheer determination to survive by a group of young boys called the Lost Boys of Sudan.www.thejourneyofthelostboys.com. It will definitely make you laugh at the innocence of the Lost Boys and cry at their tremendous suffering, especially the story about Ezekiel hidden in the acknowledgement section at the end. |
Steve_s
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Steve_s
Post Number: 205
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, December 11, 2005 - 02:56 pm: |
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My library doesn't have "The Journey of the Lost Boys" by Joan Hecht, however, a quick search returned the following recent books about Sudan. Anything you would recommend?
Inside Sudan: Political Islam, Conflict, and Catastrophe (1999) by Donald Petterson
Emma's War: An Aid Worker, a Warlord, Radical Islam, and the Politics of Oil -- A True Story of Love and Death in Sudan (2002) by Deborah Scoggins
Acts of Faith (2005) by Philip Caputo -- Fiction
Darfur: The Ambiguous Genocide (2005) by Gerard Prunier
Escape From Slavery: The True Story of My Ten Years in Captivity -- and My Journey to America (2003) by Francis Bok |
Sudan
Newbie Poster
Username: Sudan
Post Number: 4
Registered: 12-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, December 11, 2005 - 03:15 pm: |
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Some libraries do not yet have this book, but it can be purchased through www.shoppow.com, www.amazon.com, www.allianceforthelostboys.com or various other locations. It's worth the money, plus 50 % of the profits from the sale of this book benefit the forgotten people of Southern Sudan. You may want to encourage your library to purchase it. |
Steve_s
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Steve_s
Post Number: 206
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, December 11, 2005 - 05:30 pm: |
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Not directed to anyone in particular because this topic comes up a lot on the forum, but I was asking for a book recommendation, not for a cause to support through the purchase of any particular book. As I indicated, I've already read a well-reviewed book on this topic. So I'll just choose another book on my own. |
Sudan
Newbie Poster
Username: Sudan
Post Number: 5
Registered: 12-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, December 11, 2005 - 10:17 pm: |
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Sorry. I didn't recommend one of the books you listed, because someone already recommended a book on this subject at the top of this page originating this topic.I wasn't delivering a pitch, just a suggestion.I don't think you could go wrong with any book written on this subject. They are all different and most are pretty good. |
Steve_s
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Steve_s
Post Number: 207
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, December 11, 2005 - 11:59 pm: |
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Hi, no need to apologize, I did look for the book you mentioned, but since it wasn't available and considering your screen name I just thought I'd ask your opinion about the ones that were. I appreciate your judgement that one can't go wrong with most any book on the subject. I would like to read another book about Sudan. Anyway, I thank you very much. |
Sudan
Newbie Poster
Username: Sudan
Post Number: 6
Registered: 12-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, December 12, 2005 - 06:42 am: |
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If you can't find "The Journey of the Lost Boys at your library and can't afford to buy it, "Escape from slavery" would be my favorite pick from your list. However, I like "Slave" by Mende Nazer even better.You might also want to check for "The Lost Boys of Natinga" by Judy Walgren. |
Steve_s
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Steve_s
Post Number: 208
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, December 12, 2005 - 03:41 pm: |
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Thanks for your opinion Sudan, I believe the library has the Mende Nazer book you mention. Again, it's not about whether I can afford to buy the other book. If the library had had the Joan Hecht book, I would have read it in a minute, just to make a connection with you -- something I like to do, simply because people on other boards have sometimes read books I've recommended and it's made me feel very good. In addition, I've found that reading two books on the same subject can often be very enlightening -- case in point, Arc of Justice by Kevin Boyle, a highly regarded book about a murder trial in 1920s Detroit involving residential segregation. Just out of curiosity, I read Phyllis Vine's "One Man's Castle," and damned if I didn't find it a better book in some ways, or at least, in the way it covered the trial and described the defense strategy. I liked both, but since I don't have any stake in Kevin Boyle's book, I have no problem saying that.
I will look for the books you mention and check out the Mende Nazar book.
Thanks, steve
PS Another forum, a newspaper book forum, annually selects 100 books -- divided more-or-less equally between fiction and nonfiction -- and they solicited comments from readers about which books that did not make the list should have. I suggested John Wideman's "God's Gym," which, although it may not have been my favorite book of the year, I thought belonged there, based partly on the quality of the writing and partly on his stature as a major American writer, as well as the time it took them to review it -- which was about 6 weeks plus, as far as I can tell, Zadie Smith's is the only novel representing black America.
Funny this is that a few weeks later there was a beautiful post from a woman who identified herself as a university librarian somewhere, who said that she had read very little fiction published in the past year, but of the 6 books she had read, "God's Gym" was her favorite! God, I was so touched by that (she had read it based on what I said, and judging by her name she was probably a Jewish woman). |
Sudan
Newbie Poster
Username: Sudan
Post Number: 7
Registered: 12-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, December 12, 2005 - 04:17 pm: |
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I agree. I would much rather read a book that someone has recommended.I hope they have Slave at your library and that you will not stop reading about Sudan after only two books. There is so much to learn about the long running civil war between the north and south of that country, as well as the genocide that has taken place there. |
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