Refugee
by Alan Gratz
Summary
After the horror of Kristallnacht, Josef’s family knows it’s time to leave Germany. In 1994, Isabel hunts for gasoline for the homemade boat that will help her family and neighbors flee Cuba. In 2015, Mahmoud’s family is shell-shocked from the long war in Syria, hoping a perilous trek out of Aleppo can bring them to a more peaceful land. Gratz’s triptych of alternating refugee stories delivers a gut-wrenching look at the terror of escaping a homeland that offers only repression or death. The young narrators are strongly rendered players in their own family dramas. Josef details the betrayal of Jewish refugees on board the St. Louis, denied asylum by Cuba in 1939. Isabel recounts the shark attack on her flimsy boat in open waters. Mahmoud knows he will “never forget that feeling of paralyzing terror, of powerlessness” in the face of death and humiliation as he bravely soldiers on to Europe. Some readers may prefer to read each story sequentially rather than in separated chapters, but this is a haunting fictional treatment of historic events.
Reading Sessions - Links to Activities
- Chapters 1–6 — Meet Josef, Isabel & Mahmoud
- Chapters 7–12 — What Would You Carry? | Resources, Uncertainty & Difficult Choices
- Chapters 13–18 — Responsibility Line + Case Talk | Family & Responsibility
- Chapters 19–24 — Survival Systems Relay | Survival & Human Needs
- Chapters 25–30 — Healthcare Access Escape Path | Systems, Access & Help
- Chapters 31–36 — Listening Lab | Listening & Being Seen
- Chapters 37–42 — Visual Decision Portrait | Choices, Risk & Competing Pressures
- Chapters 43–48 — Invisible → Visible | Visibility, Voice & Advocacy
- Chapters 49–53 — Museum of One Object | Sacrifice, Belonging & Memory
Culminating Projects
Then → Now → Us
Other Resources / Printable Materials
- Chapters 7–12 — What Would You Carry? | Printable Activity Materials
Chapters 13–18 — Responsibility Line + Case Talk | Printable Activity Materials
Book | PDF