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2006 Christopher Award

“In a harrowing account of the war, three young refugees in California remember how they were driven from their homes in Southern Sudan in the ethnic and religious conflicts that have left two million dead. They tell their stories quietly with the help of their mentor, coauthor Judy Bernstein, in clear, interwoven, narratives that put a personal face on statistics.”

—Booklist

“[The book] represent[s] genuine, heartfelt examples of what war does to young people and how they may adjust to life outside the country of their birth, especially the social and intellectual problems they experience.”

—Deseret Morning News

They Poured Fire on Us From the Sky: The Story of Three Lost Boys from Sudan

Written by Benjamin Ajak, Alephonsion Deng, Benson Deng, and Judy A. Bernstein
Published by PublicAffairs

10th Anniversary Edition

The inspiring story of three young Sudanese boys who were driven from their homes by civil war and began an epic odyssey of survival, facing life-threatening perils, ultimately finding their way to a new life in America.

Between 1987 and 1989, Alepho, Benjamin, and Benson, like tens of thousands of young boys, took flight from the massacres of Sudan’s civil war. They became known as the Lost Boys. With little more than the clothes on their backs, sometimes not even that, they streamed out over Sudan in search of refuge. Their journey led them first to Ethiopia and then, driven back into Sudan, toward Kenya. They walked nearly one thousand miles, sustained only by the sheer will to live.

They Poured Fire on Us from the Sky is the three boys’ account of that unimaginable journey. With the candor and the purity of their child’s-eye-vision, Alephonsian, Benjamin, and Benson recall by turns: how they endured the hunger and strength-sapping illnesses-dysentery, malaria, and yellow fever; how they dodged the life-threatening predators-lions, snakes, crocodiles and soldiers alike-that dogged their footsteps; and how they grappled with a war that threatened continually to overwhelm them. Their story is a lyrical, captivating, timeless portrait of a childhood hurled into wartime and how they had the good fortune and belief in themselves to survive.

Primary ISBN:
Publication Date: August 2015
Available As: Paperback, eBook
Memoir, Nonfiction, Age 18 or older

Community Represented:

Themes: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Setting: Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya, United States

Character's Place in the Immigration Journey: Refugee, On Journey, Refugee Camp

Book Creator(s) Connection to the Community Represented: Own Voices/Lived Experience

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Discussion Guide

Source: PublicAffairs