by Janne Teller
First published 2016
You live in Denmark. You go to school, hang out with friends, complain about your parents. Then war erupts in your country. Bombs fall on Copenhagen. Your family packs what they can carry and runs. You become a refugee seeking shelter in Egypt, a place where you don't speak the language or understand the customs. Everything familiar disappears. Your comfortable European life becomes a memory as you navigate camps, bureaucracy, and the daily struggle of displacement. The people around you view you with suspicion or pity. You must rebuild your identity in a world that sees you as an outsider. This reversal of the typical refugee narrative forces you to experience what millions face when they flee their homes. The story strips away assumptions about who becomes displaced and why, revealing the universal human cost of conflict.
Genres: fiction, historical-fiction, contemporary, 21st-century
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: fish-out-of-water, found-family
Setting: Copenhagen, Denmark, Egypt
Period: 21st-century
60 pages · Paperback · Seix Barral
Content warnings: war