No Place to Call Home

May 15, 2018
Teenage Jean and his family?Mami, Papa, and younger sister Marie?are recent refugees from the Congo living in North London. The new boy at school, Jean struggles to fit in, becoming best friends with a free-spirited boy named James, who will manage to get himself and Jean?as collateral damage?suspended. Otherwise their friendship is a quiet one, as is the life of Jean's family, though always overshadowed by the fear of being deported. Much of the book is told in flashbacks as it records the younger lives of Mami and Papa, their courtship, Papa's studying in Brussels, and, ultimately, their flight from their home in Kinshasa in the wake of the terrible dangers caused by increasing political unrest. The author's style is highly descriptive, rich in simile and metaphor, and laced with words and phrases in Lingala, adding verisimilitude to the plot. Although set in the 1980s, the book is exceedingly timely, speaking to the condition of refugees today, of people like Jean who are urgently searching for a home. But will they find it?(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)