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list price: $9.95
edition:Paperback
category: Young Adult Fiction
published: Sep 2010
ISBN:9780888999740
publisher: Groundwood Books Ltd

No Safe Place

by Deborah Ellis

tagged: emigration & immigration, prejudice & racism
Description

Finalist for the Ruth and Sylvia Schwartz Children's Book Award

Orphaned and plagued with the grief of losing everyone he loves, fifteen-year-old Abdul has made a long, fraught journey from his war-torn home in Baghdad, only to end up in The Jungle -- the squalid, makeshift migrant community in Calais.

When an altercation at the soup kitchen ends up with him accidently stabbing a policeman, Abdul has to flee, and in desperation he takes a spot in a small boat heading to England. A sudden skirmish leaves the boat stalled in the middle of the Channel, the pilot dead, and four young people remaining -- Abdul; Rosalia, a Romani girl who has escaped from the white slave trade; Cheslav, gone AWOL from a Russian military school; and Jonah, the boat pilot's ten-year-old nephew.

The four of them end up hijacking a yacht and, despite their fear and mistrust, they form a kind of makeshift family. And as the authorities close in on them, they find refuge in an unusual place -- a child's secret cave on the English coast.

About the Author

Deborah Ellis

DEBORAH ELLIS is the author of The Breadwinner, which has been published in thirty languages. She has won the Governor General’s Award, the Middle East Book Award, the Peter Pan Prize, the Jane Addams Children’s Book Award and the Vicky Metcalf Award. A recipient of the Order of Canada, Deborah has donated more than $2 million in royalties to organizations such as Right to Learn Afghanistan, Mental Health Without Borders and the UNHCR. She lives in Simcoe, Ontario.

Recommended Age, Grade, and Reading Levels
Age:
0
Grade:
p to 12
Reading age:
0
Awards
  • Short-listed, SYRCA Snow Willow Award
  • Commended, CCBC Best Books for Kids & Teens
  • Commended, Resource Links' Year's Best
  • Commended, OLA Best Bets
Editorial Reviews

Flashbacks to each character's personal story are interwoven with the present-tense violence, prejudice, kindness, and community that the young characters find on their journey.

— Booklist

This novel moves fast and furiously...exciting and moving.

— School Library Journal, STARRED REVIEW

Flashbacks involving the effects of war and poverty on communities and families drive this fast-paced and heart-wrenching narrative, which deals honestly with countless harsh realities.

— Publishers Weekly Online

What the best literature for young readers can be-simple, elegant language crafted to tell a story as full and rich as life itself. Eminently memorable.

— Kirkus Reviews, STARRED REVIEW

Ellis' young readers love her because she speaks to them as intelligent, empathetic beings who will soon have agency in the world, and in No Safe Place, this gift is still powerfully evident.

— Quill & Quire, STARRED REVIEW

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