The Waiting Place

March 1, 2022
Profiles of 10 different young people from various ethnic groups who are stuck waiting in a refugee camp in Greece after fleeing Afghanistan and Iran. The children, ages roughly 5 to 13, find ways to pass the time, some more successfully than others--playing with a bow fashioned from an old bedspring, reading, drawing, and engaging in pretend play. Older kids sometimes get to go to school outside the gated, guarded camp. The afterword by Nayeri, herself a former child refugee from Iran forced to wait for resettlement, stresses the importance of centering our common humanity, calling on governments and readers to act. The striking color photos and brief text sometimes tell different stories: Certainly, there is danger, boredom, and difficulty as emphasized in the text; there is also creativity, laughter, and resilience as shown in the photos. In contrast to more commonly seen narratives about dangerous flights from home or the challenges of settling in a new country, this work highlights the sometimes yearslong waits some refugees have in camps. Nayeri asks readers to extend kindness because refugees will be "ragged and tired and sad" upon arrival in the West; while true for some, this may reinforce discriminatory fears about mental health. The book's often universalist depiction of refugees is a weakness, but its strength is offering a peek into real refugees' lives. A window into life in a refugee camp--portrayed as a place to wait to be rescued. (glossary, author's note) (Nonfiction. 12-adult)

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March 15, 2022
Grades 5-8 This is an unflinching look at the lives of a group of refugee children from Afghanistan and Iran who live in shipping crate shelters in a Greek refugee camp for months or years, hoping to be granted asylum. The camp, known as the Waiting Place, is its own character, keeping the children stuck indefinitely. Sparse text combined with Miralpeix's arresting full-page color photographs intimately capture the kids' daily lives. Despite their situation, many photos show the kids joyfully acting like kids: young Kosar jumps on her bed as she imagines "herself taking off like a bird to another place." In her afterword, Nayeri, a refugee herself, says the Waiting Place hasn't defeated everyone. She met children there who are "becoming braver, kinder, more astonishing versions of themselves." For American readers, this moving look at these young people and their hopes and dreams could lead to greater understanding and empathy for all displaced youth.

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Starred review from June 1, 2022

Gr 6 Up-Influential and compelling color photographs illuminate the traumatic and devastating plight of refugee children, many from Iran or Afghanistan, living at the Katsikas refugee camp in Ioannina, Greece. Nayeri, a former refugee herself, creates a nonfiction work that will tug at heartstrings by putting a face to the harsh reality refugee children experience living in cramped shipping crates or trailer homes. Nayeri talks about the psychology and pain of waiting in limbo and how it takes the joy out of life. This stunning title appeals to readers' emotions and highlights the human toll of the refugee crisis. Nayeri's work could be used in sociology, history, or government classes, as well as literature units on persuasive writing. An afterword includes facts about refugees before COVID-19, changes made by the Geneva Convention, and a glossary. Important questions are raised about why actual numbers are low for refugees applying for asylum, and how citizens of the world can actually help by appealing to lawmakers. Perhaps this text will be the proverbial axe that breaks through frozen indifference and inspires some heartfelt action. VERDICT An important nonfiction tool in social emotional learning to draw attention to the harsh realities facing refugee children around the world.-Laura Dooley-Taylor

Copyright 2022 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

June 27, 2022
This picture book debut by Nayeri profiles 10 children at the Katsikas camp outside Ioannna, Greece. Opening with a personification of the Waiting Place as initially compassionate (“It is very sorry. It has been waiting for you”), and then increasingly sinister (“It wants more children and mothers and fathers. It doesn’t want you to visit the nearby lake... It craves your hours, weeks, years”), the text soon introduces some of the camp’s child residents alongside their friends and siblings. Five-year-old Matin, who’s from Afghanistan and previously stayed at “Moria, the most evil of all the waiting places,” makes a bow from an old bedspring and wants to be “the man who fills the planes with fuel. Without him, nobody can fly.” Bosch Miralpeix’s photographs provide an intimate glimpse of the camp and its quarters. Though the personification of the camp wavers in effectiveness, unclearly stating, for example, why it “wants you to be a child forever,” Nayari’s focus on children’s daily life grounds the volume, offering rich conversation starters about refugee experiences and mass displacement. An afterword, glossary, and author’s note offer helpful context. Ages 12–up.

May 1, 2022
"When home is lost and a new one not yet found, children are sent to the Waiting Place." In this powerful photo-essay, the Waiting Place is the Katsikas refugee camp in Greece, which Nayeri and Miralpeix visited in 2018. Katsikas is supposed to be a temporary home for refugees from Afghanistan and Iran, but as Nayeri describes in her poetic text, the camp is a "gated mouth" that children pass through and then drift while time slips away. "They forget things: first their sums, their street names, their best books. Then beloved faces, stories." Miralpeix's photographs effectively set the "field of shipping crates turned into homes" against a contrasting background of blue skies and misty mountains, highlighting Katsikas's harsh conditions. Nayeri personifies the Waiting Place as a beast hungry for more lives, and the strength of the volume is its focus on real children, including five-year-old Matin from Afghanistan, his friends Ahmad and Hashmat, and his ten-year-old sister Mobina and her friends. Both text and photos compassionately humanize young refugees who, despite coping with unimaginable trauma, have talents and dreams; readers will come away with a deeper understanding of the refugee crisis, which is addressed more fully in a lengthy afterword. A glossary and an author's note are appended. Dean Schneider

(Copyright 2022 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

January 1, 2022
"When home is lost and a new one not yet found, children are sent to the Waiting Place." In this powerful photo-essay, the Waiting Place is the Katsikas refugee camp in Greece, which Nayeri and Miralpeix visited in 2018. Katsikas is supposed to be a temporary home for refugees from Afghanistan and Iran, but as Nayeri describes in her poetic text, the camp is a "gated mouth" that children pass through and then drift while time slips away. "They forget things: first their sums, their street names, their best books. Then beloved faces, stories."" Miralpeix's photographs effectively set the "field of shipping crates turned into homes" against a contrasting background of blue skies and misty mountains, highlighting Katsikas's harsh conditions. Nayeri personifies the Waiting Place as a beast hungry for more lives, and the strength of the volume is its focus on real children, including five-year-old Matin from Afghanistan, his friends Ahmad and Hashmat, and his ten-year-old sister Mobina and her friends. Both text and photos compassionately humanize young refugees who, despite coping with unimaginable trauma, have talents and dreams; readers will come away with a deeper understanding of the refugee crisis, which is addressed more fully in a lengthy afterword. A glossary and an author's note are appended.

(Copyright 2022 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)