House Without Walls

House Without Walls

by Ching Yeung Russell

For most people, home is a place with four walls. It’s a place to eat, sleep, rest, and live. For a refugee, the concept of home is ever-changing, ever-moving, ever-wavering. And often, it doesn’t have any walls at all.

Eleven-year-old Lam escapes from Vietnam with Dee Dee during the Vietnamese Boat People Exodus in 1979, when people from Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia fled their homelands for safety. For a refugee, the trip is a long and perilous one, filled with dangerous encounters with pirates and greedy sailors, a lack of food and water, and even the stench of a dead body onboard. When they finally arrive at a refugee camp, Lam befriends Dao, a girl her age who becomes like a sister-a welcome glimmer of happiness after a terrifying journey.

Readers will feel as close to Lam as the jade pendant she wears around her neck, sticking by her side throughout her journey as she experiences fear, crushing loss, boredom, and some small moments of joy along the way.

Written in verse, this is a heartfelt story that is sure to build empathy and compassion for refugees around the world escaping oppression.


Ages: 10-Up
ISBN: 9781499808759
Price: $16.99
Published by: Little Bee Books

More

  • Bear on a Bike
  • Cranky Makes a Friend
  • Finding Courage
  • The Good Night Garage
  • Kai’s Ocean of Curiosities
  • Maud and Addie
  • Nudi Gill—Poison Powerhouse of the Sea
  • Richard Scarry’s Cars and Trucks and Things That Go (50th Anniversary Edition)
  • Story Monsters Among Us
  • Victories Greater Than Death
  • The Belly Button Express
  • Cylinderella
  • Finley—A Moose on the Caboose
  • Hansel and Diesel and the Witch’s Factory
  • Kiki’s Dream
  • Max and Mama
  • Oh! Look, A Boat
  • Ride Beside Me
  • Taco Truck
  • Vroom, Zoom Any Room?
Back to Top