When Stars are Scattered
by Victoria Jamieson & Omar Mohamed
Hi! I have a brother who is two years younger than me. Because we are so close in age, we like to hang out with each other a lot. Do you have any siblings? In this graphic novel, Omar has a little brother as well. His brother is a lot younger than him and has a disability, so Omar feels the need to protect him. Sometimes, Omar protects him too much…
Omar and his little brother, Hassan, live in a refugee camp. Their mother is missing and their father is dead, so they have a foster parent who treats them as her own. Hassan has a disability in which he can only say one word which is “Hooyo,” which, in another language, means “Mama.” Omar is used to hanging out all day with Hassan, but one day, his guardian persuades him to go to school. He later gets a chance to enter an application to go to America. He does the best that he can on the application, but he does not hear back from them for a while. He is starting to lose hope that he’ll ever leave the camp.
I wish that, in this book, the background of Omar and Hassan had been explained a little more. I would just like more details about what happened to make them move to the refugee camp in the first place.
Even though Omar overprotected his brother, I really liked the connection that the two of them shared. For the first few days after Omar started going to school, Hassan grew angry and felt confined. He even ran away a few times. This shows not only how deeply attached Omar was to Hassan, but also how deeply attached Hassan was to Omar. How special to love and be loved so fiercely!
This book was very unique. I had never read a graphic novel or any other book about refugee camps. It helped widen my sense of the world.
Will Omar and Hassan ever escape to America, or will they stay doomed to a life of not enough food, water, or freedom every day? As I always say, read the book to find out!
A few helpful things I like to say about the books I read:
“Run and Get Mom” (how I describe the scariness factor – zero being not scary at all and five being majorly scary): 2
“Yucky-Lovey Stuff” (how I describe the romance factor – zero having no yucky-lovey parts in it and five having major yucky-lovey parts): 4
I give this book 5 wands.
This book was an amazing story about never giving up and about love. Omar never gave up on Hassan, and they decided to stick together no matter what happened.
