true account, Sudan, horrific but also with heart ( )

great book ( )

In 1987, Alephonsion and Benson Deng, along with their cousin Benjamin -- not one of them older than seven -- fled with thousands of other children during attacks on their rural villages in southern Sudan, walking hundreds of miles over many months to escape the conflict, which followed close in their footsteps. With only a handful of grown adults to guide and encourage them, the boys were compelled to forage for their own food and build their own shelters, all the while at the mercy of the hot, arid environment and hazards of local wildlife. Shunted from refugee camp to refugee camp, they ultimately saw many of their brethren succumb to starvation, disease or violence, before finally -- after fourteen years in refugee camps -- Alepho, Benson and Benjamin were approved to enter the U.S. in hopes of rebuilding their lives and healing themselves.

The plight of refugees, fragile lives stuck in impossible, unrelenting limbo, are described in frank and painful detail. There could not be a more timely or heartbreaking read for 2017. ( )

Common reading on our campus this year. A tragic tale. Similar to What is the What by Dave Eggers, which I enjoyed but similarly horrified me. Young boys escape violence in their South Sudanese village by fleeing to Kenya and other refugee camps, mostly unaccompanied and mostly on foot. ( )

Republic of South Sudan.

The interwoven tales of three of Sudan's Lost Boys provide a devastatingly personal look at the Second Sudanese Civil War. One of the audiobook readers was so garbled that I turned to the print edition instead. ( )