Review by Choice Review
In 2015, there was a large influx of migrants and refugees into Greece, mainly through the country's islands. This book looks at the response to this phenomenon by official agencies and volunteers. Sachs, a journalist and novelist, was one of those volunteers. To help with the effort she established the nonprofit Humanity Now: Direct Refugee Relief. Her account offers a sympathetic view of the migrants/refugees and the volunteers, all of whom she describes primarily through seven individuals and families. The volunteers were filling the gap left by the inadequate response to the crisis from governments, official agencies, and NGOs. This was at a time when countries in Europe were starting to accept fewer people seeking asylum. There is an awareness in the book of the limits of what volunteers can do and the problems they can cause. Sachs does not portray migrants/refugees as helpless or perfect, and she clearly conveys people's resourcefulness and generosity as well as the size and complexity of the situation. As large numbers of people continue to leave their home countries for wealthier nations due to difficult situations, this book provides a personal look at what that entails. Summing Up: Recommended. General readers and undergraduates. --Janice E. Weaver, emerita, Drake University
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Booklist Review
Of all the places Sachs (The Secret of the Nightingale Palace, 2013) could begin this complex, massive, local-but-global story of the migrant aid crisis in Greece, she opens on a Lesvos beach in 2015 where two volunteer workers stand. Sachs focuses on volunteers inside and outside the migrant community who are not affiliated with larger organizations. The movement, which experiences stunning successes and failures, eventually matures from disorganized to substantial. Ultimately, Sachs' inquiry courageously considers the very nature of volunteering, asking straight-to-the-heart questions such as whether volunteer work perpetuates a failed system by providing a stopgap by which governments can abdicate their responsibilities. The author's journalistic interest in the migrant aid crisis evolves into her own volunteer work. Readers will meet Rima, a mother of six who cooks dinner for as many as 400 people a day while living in illegal housing, and Jenni, who drives a van full of tools to make repairs in migrant camps. This people-first, intensely researched, deeply personal, and altogether devastating call to action tells us that when all else fails, volunteer.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Journalist and novelist Sachs (The Secret of the Nightingale Palace) delivers a moving eyewitness account of the 2015--2019 refugee crisis in Greece and the grassroots relief networks that emerged in response. In 2015, one million refugees and migrants from the Middle East and Africa crossed the Mediterranean into Europe. An estimated 3,700 people drowned during the journey, while Greece, burdened with an economic crisis, struggled to help those who made it to shore. With the world's major humanitarian organizations and the E.U. constricted by their own internal rules and slow-moving bureaucracy, dozens of ad hoc volunteer organizations fed and cared for the displaced. Sachs describes dystopian refugee camps devoid of basic comforts such as beds, running water, and electricity, and profiles refugees including the Khalil family, who fled Syria with the help of smugglers and lived in a makeshift camp in a gas station and a squat in Athens before they were granted asylum by Germany. Throughout, Sachs interweaves incisive analysis of such policies as the E.U.'s plan to give Turkey €3 billion in refugee aid in exchange for clamping down on "irregular migration" with heartfelt profiles of migrants and aid workers. This is a stunning portrait of hardship, despair, and resilience. Agent: Douglas Stewart, Sterling Lord Literistic. (Mar.)
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
When governments fail to rescue those fleeing political terror, it's up to volunteers to step in. Sachs, a journalist and co-founder of Humanity Now: Direct Refugee Relief, opens her account in a ramshackle district of Athens, the capital of the nation through which, by 2015, more than 800,000 refugees from Africa and Asia had passed on the way to other parts of Europe. "They needed help," writes the author, "but Greece, buried in debt, did not have resources to address the crisis." The EU distributed millions of euros, but inefficiently, while the U.N. was slow to react. Consequently, private individuals from all over the world came to the aid of the refugees, providing food, medical assistance, clothing, and other necessities. Altruism underlay most of their efforts, but, as one British woman told Sachs, "We'd had our own shit." Having experienced troubles with the immigration system herself, she had empathy for the experiences of the Syrians, Afghans, and others who had wound up in that Greek camp with no place else to go. Many volunteers mustered the bravery to swim into rough waters to rescue refugees in danger of drowning after their smugglers' boats sank. Eventually, many refugees were able to aid themselves by taking donated food and cooking for hundreds of people at a time. Sadly, writes Sachs, for all the efforts of those involved, burnout is common: "Some long-term volunteers decided that close relationships with refugees drained them emotionally and compromised their effectiveness." Meanwhile, some volunteers behaved as if the camp were a holiday venue; when corrected, they protested that this was how it was in Europe and that the refugees had better get used to it. In the end, the volunteer efforts were only partially successful; the situation required professionals. "The story of displacement can't have a happy ending," writes Sachs. Still, one can only try. An account of humanitarian aid that is both inspiring and troubling. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
