Overview

**A Guardian book to look out for in 2024** 'An exceptional book: a mediation on family; an interrogation of movement and borders; a reflection on how someone can become separated from their own personal history; and an argument that it is never too late to reconnect with what was lost' SALLY HAYDEN ‘A compelling story from a gifted storyteller … In a moment where refugees are often talked about but rarely heard from, her voice breaks through’ GARY YOUNGE A staggering investigation into the costs and consequences of displacement, from a young woman uniquely placed to explore the refugee experience and its aftershocks In 2015, Aamna Mohdin travelled to Calais to report from the frontlines of the refugee crisis. When she returned to London, and discussed what she had seen with her parents, their response surprised her: didn’t she remember being a refugee herself? Aamna was faced with a reality she had been outrunning for nearly two decades: that her parents had been refugees of the Somali civil war; and that her arrival in the UK aged seven had been preceded by an early childhood in a refugee camp, followed by years of displacement and desperation – as her family, sometimes together but often separated, fought for a place to call home. For the first time, Aamna’s parents told her their story: of the lives they had built in the newly independent Somalia, and the shattering effects of civil war that followed. From London, she travelled to Somalia, a homecoming to a place that had never been home; before retracing her parents’ flight to Kenya, and the Kakuma refugee camp – the site of a very present refugee crisis, now three decades in the making. Scattered is a staggering investigation into the costs and consequences of displacement, from a young woman uniquely placed to explore the refugee experience and its aftershocks. A powerful reportage, it is also an epic story of returns and reunions; and a joyful celebration of family and belonging. ‘The only way out of the crisis of exclusion sweeping across the Atlantic Ocean is storytelling … In so luminously recounting the story of her family Mohdin achieves an imaginative breakthrough that everyone should read’ SAMUEL MOYN, Professor of Law and History at Yale University

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9781526652577

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Reporting for the Guardian from the Calais refugee camp, Mohdin felt a jolt of recognition: she had once been a child refugee herself. From there she travels to Somalia, the country her parents fled, and back into her own past. * Guardian, The books to look out for in 2024 *

Aamna Mohdin is a gifted storyteller with a compelling story in which resilience and humanity triumph over tragedy and displacement. She is a trusted, honest and at times humorous guide on a journey that is fraught, brave and at times dangerous. In a moment where refugees are often talked about but rarely heard from, her voice breaks through not because it is loud but because it is lyrical -- GARY YOUNGE An absorbingly written account of exile combined with journalistic research and rigour. Aamna is such a thoughtful writer, and her voice, and this testimony, offers an essential bridge between discourse on migration in Britain and the lived experiences of many Britons, which are too often disregarded -- SALLY HAYDEN, author of the Orwell Prize-winning My Fourth Time, We Drowned The only way out of the crisis of exclusion sweeping across the Atlantic Ocean is storytelling that overcomes apathy and scapegoating in favour of empathy and hospitality. In so luminously recounting the story of her family, and the exodus from Somalia to the United Kingdom she and her parents have lived, Aamna Mohdin achieves an imaginative breakthrough that everyone should read -- SAMUEL MOYN, Professor of Law and History at Yale University Reporting for the Guardian from the Calais refugee camp, Mohdin felt a jolt of recognition: she had once been a child refugee herself. From there she travels to Somalia, the country her parents fled, and back into her own past. * Guardian, The books to look out for in 2024 * Powerful and evocative * Bookseller, Editor's Choice *

Author Information

Aamna Mohdin is the Guardian’s first community affairs correspondent, reporting on the social, political and economic experiences of the UK’s diverse communities, with a particular focus on Black, Asian and minority ethnic communities. Mohdin spent her early years in the Kakuma refugee camp, Saudi Arabia, Germany and the Netherlands, before arriving in the UK aged seven. Mohdin is the winner of the British Journalism Award 2022 and her work has been shortlisted for the British Press Awards. She was previously a reporter at Quartz where she led the publication’s coverage of the European refugee crisis. She lives in London. @aamnamohdin

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