A heartbreaking account of a poor and illiterate young West African’s odyssey to Europe, translated by one of Britain’s most celebrated playwrights. 
Ibrahima, whose family live in a village in the West African country of Guinea, helps his father sell shoes at a street stall in the capital, Conakry. At the sudden death of his father, he becomes the head of the family and picks up various skills, always alone and away from home, although his dream is to be a truck driver in his country. 
But when his little brother, Alhassane, suddenly disappears, heading for Europe in a bid to earn money for the family, Ibrahima leaves everything behind to try to find him and convince him to go back to their village and continue his education. In an epic journey, Ibrahima risks his life many times searching for his little brother. 
Each waystation that Ibrahima passes through takes him to another world, with different customs, other languages, other landscapes, other currencies, and new challenges to overcome. His willpower is astonishing, and the friendship and generosity of strangers he encounters on the way help him to keep going. 
After enduring many trials and tribulations, he learns of Alhassane’s fate. Unable to return home, he embarks on the journey to Europe himself. 
Little Brother is a testimonial account that gives a voice, heart, and soul, and flesh and bones to the seemingly nameless masses of people struggling and dying, trying only to achieve a better life for themselves and their families.

Little Brother: an odyssey to Europe

Biographies & Memoirs

Balde, Ibrahima

Arzallus Antia, Amets

Community & Culture

Scribe UK

Based on the author's own life, this heartbreaking novel about an African migrant takes you inside the refugee crisis--for readers of The Lost Children's Archive and The Girl with the Louding Voice. &nbsp; Ibrahima is still a boy when his father dies, but as the eldest son he must leave their home village in the Guinean countryside in search of work to support his family. Eventually apprenticed to a trucker in the capital, he learns that his younger brother has dropped out of school and fled to Libya to pursue the dream of finding work in Europe. Leaving behind everything, Ibrahima sets off with the aim to convince his little brother to return home and complete his education. &nbsp; His journey, full of hardships and sometimes on foot, takes Ibrahima north to Mali and across the Sahara Desert to the refugee camps of North Africa--to Algeria, Libya, and then back west to Morocco. Stopping along the way to recover physically or earn money, he encounters untold cruelties as well as kindness. His savings are taken at gunpoint. In the desert, he is held in a prison that serves as a slave market. In Libya, imprisoned again, he is sold to a chicken farmer but escapes for the second time. Only then, in a camp in Algeria, does he learn that his brother may have drowned attempting to cross the Mediterranean. Grief-stricken, burdened by guilt, and unable to face his mother, he too arranges passage across the sea in a Zodiac. &nbsp; The author, Ibrahima Balde, was rescued at sea and found refuge in the Basque Country of Spain. Based on his true-life story told to a traditional bard from the Basque Country and retold here, Little Brother is a deeply moving, eye-opening novel that gives voice and a face to the refugee crisis, illuminating the plight of migrants from many lands.

Little Brother: A Refugee's Odyssey

Literature & Fiction

United States

Arcade

Miñan

Contemporary

Susa

Este libro te cambiará. Esta historia arranca así: «Estoy en Europa pero yo no quería venir a Europa». Ibrahima Balde nació en Guinea, pero se vio forzado a abandonar su casa para ir a buscar a su hermano pequeño. No salió para perseguir un sueño. Abandonó su hogar para encontrar a la persona que más quería. Una mirada ingenua, castigada, arrebatadoramente poética y, en definitiva, única. La de quien ha sufrido todo y, sin embargo, tiene el poder de convertirlo en algo útil. En algo bello. «El mundo sería un lugar mejor si todos leyéramos a Ibrahima.» JORDI EVOLE «No es un libro de poesía, pero es el libro de mayor intensidad poética que he leído en los últimos años.» ANDREA ABREU «No serás la misma persona después de leer este libro. Un relato duro, triste y poético que debería ser de lectura obligatoria para darnos cuenta de que la vida es algo más que la lucha de personas contra personas.» ALBA FLORES

Hermanito: Miñán

Izagirre, Ander

Genre Fiction

Blackie Books

Hermanito. EDICIÓN ESCOLAR (incluye guía de lectura): Miñán

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