Title: Home in exile
Description: Mr Almond pays with his life when he refuses to give away his four young daughters in forced marriage to a tribal rebel leader. His young daughters, Alima, fifteen; Benatu, twelve; Tabata, thirteen and the youngest, Koshi, who was hearing-impaired, age eleven, have no choice; they must don male disguises and identities in order to stand a chance of escape in search of a new home. At dawn, the planning takes a hasty few minutes. The girls arrive at a chosen destination and a preferred route, but a gruesome journey across the largest and deadliest desert on earth awaits them, not to mention that they will be faced with the stiff challenges of sneaking through Sharia and war-ravaged countries, like the Sudan, Chad, and Algeria, where young unmarried women are forbidden from walking alone in public. For lack of options, the girls join other migrants to battle the vertical kilometres of the 3,000-foot Ahaggar Mountains. The relentless trek day and night through the rocky arid landscape via Libya into Europe becomes even more dangerous. The more they venture, the further away they find themselves - from each other, from their dreams, from themselves. Benatu unexpectedly ends up in a deadly snare, whereas Alima finds herself strangely stranded. Despite their hopelessness, the Almonds count on hope with a strong determination for vengeance. Then the unexpected happens again!
Subjects: Fiction, Emigration and immigration, Noncitizens, Forced marriage, Illegal immigration, Romans, nouvelles, Émigration et immigration, Mariage forcé, Immigration clandestine
Places: East Africa, Afrique orientale anglophone