No Safe Place

Finalist for the Ruth and Sylvia Schwartz Children's Book Award Orphaned and plagued with the grief of losing everyone he loves, fifteen - year - old Abdul has made a long, fraught journey from his war - torn home in Baghdad, only to end up in The Jungle - the squalid, makeshift migrant community in Calais. When an altercation at the soup kitchen ends up with him accidentally stabbing a policeman, Abdul has to flee, and in desperation he takes a spot in a small boat heading to England. A sudden skirmish leaves the boat stalled in the middle of the Channel, the pilot dead, and four young people remaining - Abdul, Rosalia, a Romani girl who has escaped from the white slave trade; Cheslav, gone AWOL from a Russian military school; and Jonah, the boat pilot's ten - year - old nephew. The four of them end up hijacking a yacht and, despite their fear and mistrust, they form a kind of makeshift family. And as the authorities close in on them, they find refuge in an unusual place - a child's secret cave on the English coast.