Mahmoud eventually concludes that visibility is best: “See us….Hear us. Each third-person narrative offers an accessible look at migration under duress, in which the behavior of familiar adults changes unpredictably, strangers exploit the vulnerabilities of transients, and circumstances seem driven by random luck. Each initially leaves by boat, struggles between visibility and invisibility, copes with repeated obstacles and heart-wrenching loss, and gains resilience in the process. Each traverses a landscape ruled by a dictator and must balance freedom, family, and responsibility. Yet these three refugee odysseys have so much in common. Three countries, three time periods, three brave protagonists. In the midst of political turmoil, how do you escape the only country that you’ve ever known and navigate a new life? Parallel stories of three different middle school–aged refugees-Josef from Nazi Germany in 1938, Isabel from 1994 Cuba, and Mahmoud from 2015 Aleppo-eventually intertwine for maximum impact. (photographs author’s note notes on photographs) Period photographs of equipment, posters, medical treatments and hospital facilities relating to tuberculosis add verisimilitude.Ī quiet, sober story of a genuine heroine who survives a devastating disease with grace. By describing her feelings, fears and tentative hope, she offers an inside peek at the lives of tuberculosis patients in the pre–World War II era, when there was no real cure for the disease.

Speaking first as an observer and later as an engaged participant and survivor, Evvy tells the story of her year at Loon Lake.

As time slowly passes, Evvy realizes some patients improve and leave, while others die, sometimes unexpectedly. Frightened and overwhelmed, Evvy gradually adapts to the sterile routine and discovers her fellow patients: talkative, fashionable Pearl kindhearted Beverly gruff Dena and shy Sarah, a Jewish girl who becomes her best friend. Isolated from her family, Evvy quickly learns to follow Loon Lake’s strict regimen of bed rest, diet and treatment, with no talking or visitors. In May 1940, Evvy’s father leaves her at Loon Lake Sanatorium, where she’s assigned to a ward with other teenage tuberculosis patients. Confined to a tuberculosis sanatorium in rural Minnesota, 13 year-old Evelyn Hoffmeister develops inner strength as she copes with loneliness, loss and the insidious disease that threatens her life.

Breathing Room by Marsha Hayles