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Here, Laird, author of a poignant first novel about the effects of a hydrocephalic baby on his family Loving Ben, 1989, portrays the journey of a Kurdish refugee family a story based on the real experiences in the mid 80's of Iraqi Kurds now living in England. For Tara, 13, and her family, their ordeal is cruel and often life threatening, yet they are among the lucky ones. Wealthy Baba'' secretly a power in the Kurdish military still has money even after repeated searches, while Daya'' manages to smuggle her jewels. Escaping the police as they leave their luxurious home in a city in northern Iraq, they take a taxi to their primitive vacation house in the mountains. For Tara, the return to village ways is almost as much of a shock as the bombs that eventually drive the family over the border into Iran, to a refugee camp infested with bedbugs and assaulted by deafening prayers rasped from a loudspeaker. Eventually, Baba makes contact with relatives in Teheran and passage to London is negotiated. Ever present dangers maintain suspense from a brutal street killing Tara witnesses to her older brother's miraculous escape meanwhile, Laird builds a sympathetic picture of the embattled Kurds and a compelling portrait of Tara and the sobering changes wrought in her and her family by the events, including her first startled response to a free society attractive and exciting...but frightening...as if things might suddenly get out of control''. An important contribution to the growing number of refugee stories. Fiction. 10 Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
ISBN: 0140368558
Author: Elizabeth Laird
Category: Children
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