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City of Thorns: Nine Lives in the World's Largest Refugee Camp
(OverDrive MP3 Audiobook, OverDrive Listen)

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Published:
Tantor Media, Inc. 2016
Status:
Available from OverDrive
Description
Situated hundreds of miles from any other settlement, deep within the inhospitable desert of northern Kenya, Dadaab is a city like no other. Its buildings are made from mud, sticks, or plastic, its entire economy is grey, and its citizens survive on rations and luck. Over the course of four years, Ben Rawlence became a first-hand witness to a strange and desperate limbo-land, getting to know many of those who have come there seeking sanctuary. Among them are Guled, a former child soldier who lives for football; Nisho, who scrapes an existence by pushing a wheelbarrow and dreaming of riches; and schoolgirl Kheyro, whose future hangs upon her education. In City of Thorns, Rawlence interweaves the stories of nine individuals to show what life is like in the camp and to sketch the wider political forces that keep the refugees trapped there. Rawlence combines intimate storytelling with broad socio-political investigative journalism, doing for Dadaab what Katherine Boo's Behind the Beautiful Forevers did for the Mumbai slums. Lucid, vivid, and illuminating, City of Thorns is an urgent human story with deep international repercussions, brought to life through the people who call Dadaab home.
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Format:
OverDrive MP3 Audiobook, OverDrive Listen
Edition:
Unabridged
Street Date:
04/26/2016
Language:
English
ISBN:
9781515925040
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Citations
APA Citation (style guide)

Ben Rawlence. (2016). City of Thorns: Nine Lives in the World's Largest Refugee Camp. Unabridged Tantor Media, Inc.

Chicago / Turabian - Author Date Citation (style guide)

Ben Rawlence. 2016. City of Thorns: Nine Lives in the World's Largest Refugee Camp. Tantor Media, Inc.

Chicago / Turabian - Humanities Citation (style guide)

Ben Rawlence, City of Thorns: Nine Lives in the World's Largest Refugee Camp. Tantor Media, Inc, 2016.

MLA Citation (style guide)

Ben Rawlence. City of Thorns: Nine Lives in the World's Largest Refugee Camp. Unabridged Tantor Media, Inc, 2016.

Note! Citation formats are based on standards as of July 2022. Citations contain only title, author, edition, publisher, and year published. Citations should be used as a guideline and should be double checked for accuracy.
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Grouped Work ID:
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Needs Update?:
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Date Added:
Jun 12, 2018 18:13:45
Date Updated:
Dec 09, 2020 17:20:21
Last Metadata Check:
Mar 24, 2024 09:42:16
Last Metadata Change:
Jun 04, 2023 14:44:32
Last Availability Check:
Mar 24, 2024 09:42:18
Last Availability Change:
Sep 03, 2023 10:20:12
Last Grouped Work Modification Time:
Mar 28, 2024 02:11:39

OverDrive Product Record

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Situated hundreds of miles from any other settlement, deep within the inhospitable desert of northern Kenya, Dadaab is a city like no other. Its buildings are made from mud, sticks, or plastic, its entire economy is grey, and its citizens survive on rations and luck. Over the course of four years, Ben Rawlence became a first-hand witness to a strange and desperate limbo-land, getting to know many of those who have come there seeking sanctuary. Among them are Guled, a former child soldier who lives for football; Nisho, who scrapes an existence by pushing a wheelbarrow and dreaming of riches; and schoolgirl Kheyro, whose future hangs upon her education. In City of Thorns, Rawlence interweaves the stories of nine individuals to show what life is like in the camp and to sketch the wider political forces that keep the refugees trapped there. Rawlence combines intimate storytelling with broad socio-political investigative journalism, doing for Dadaab what Katherine Boo's Behind the Beautiful Forevers did for the Mumbai slums. Lucid, vivid, and illuminating, City of Thorns is an urgent human story with deep international repercussions, brought to life through the people who call Dadaab home.
reviews
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        Starred review from August 24, 2015
        Rawlence (Radio Congo), who worked in Africa for Human Rights Watch between 2006 and 2012, brings to horrifying life the conditions in the U.N.-administered refugee camp in Dadaab, a town in northern Kenya. By combining his own experiences with interviews with residents of Dadaab, he makes the human rights crisis—rarely covered in the media—vivid and immediate for readers. Rawlence delves into the stories of nine people, putting particular emphasis on Guled, who was born in Mogadishu in 1993 at the same time as the downing of two American Black Hawk helicopters. Rawlence describes how the Black Hawk wreckage became a play area for Guled, foreshadowing his life of deprivation and struggle, mostly within the confines of Dadaab. These and other telling details will resonate with readers long after they finish the book. Rawlence eloquently expresses his moral outrage at the conditions Guled and others endure, as when he notes that a “refugee camp has the structure of punishment without the crime,” running on “visibility and control—the same principles that guide a prison.” This is a compelling examination of the tragedy of a place where one “can only survive... by imagining a life elsewhere.” 5 b&w maps. Agent: Sophie Lambert, Conville & Walsh (U.K.).

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Situated hundreds of miles from any other settlement, deep within the inhospitable desert of northern Kenya, Dadaab is a city like no other. Its buildings are made from mud, sticks, or plastic, its entire economy is grey, and its citizens survive on rations and luck. Over the course of four years, Ben Rawlence became a first-hand witness to a strange and desperate limbo-land, getting to know many of those who have come there seeking sanctuary. Among them are Guled, a former child soldier who lives for football; Nisho, who scrapes an existence by pushing a wheelbarrow and dreaming of riches; and schoolgirl Kheyro, whose future hangs upon her education. In City of Thorns, Rawlence interweaves the stories of nine individuals to show what life is like in the camp and to sketch the wider political forces that keep the refugees trapped there. Rawlence combines intimate storytelling with broad socio-political investigative journalism, doing for Dadaab what Katherine Boo's Behind the...
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