The Book Collectors: A Band of Syrian Rebels and the Stories That Carried Them Through a War - Delphine Minoui - ★★★★.½

AUTHOR: Delphine Minoui

TRANSLATOR: Lara Vergnaud

GENRE: Nonfiction

PUBLICATION DATE: November 3, 2020.

RATING: 4.5 stars.

Life under a lockdown is never easy. To avoid going into depression, I've been reading a lot of books to show me that my life is still decent. This includes reading uplifting books or books that depict others' much-worse reality.

The Book Collectors is in the second category. I opted for this ARC because of the title, the author and the subject.

Written by Award-winning journalist Delphine Minoui, The Book Collectors recounts the true story from war-ravaged Syria. A group of young rebels, who haven't left their locked-down town of Daraya in 3-4 years, face unimaginable hardships on a daily basis: lack of food, no access to education or health facilities, poor net connectivity. (Imagine living your life in this lockdown without the WiFi!) The only thing almost guaranteed is hunger, a regular shower of bombs and sometimes even poison gas.

To create a haven of some positivity in such dire circumstances, the rebels create a library in a basement using books found in the rubble of war. As Minoui says, "The soups made of leaves to stave off starvation. The voracious reading to nourish the mind. The library is their hidden fortress against the bombs. Books are their weapons of mass instruction."

Forty or so volunteers— activists, students, rebels— wait for the planes to go silent so they can salvage the books from "abandoned houses, destroyed offices and disintegrating mosques". They collect the books, repair the damages with glue, and ensure that every book is numbered and carries its owner’s name, in case of their return.

Minoui found a photo of this volunteer library on the Humans of Syria page and that simple discovery led to this amazing story being shared with the world. Her interactions with these men were primarily over WhatsApp. The book talks not just of the library but also of the heartaches and the sufferings of the young men running it.

Minoui, being a journalist, has a great control over her writing. To take the little scraps of info she received on WhatsApp, intersperse it with her personal thoughts and create a 200 page book isn't no mean task. Minoui handles it in an adept manner. The narrative gets a little pedantic at times, but then again, the topic is such. The straightforward reporting helps cover the anguish of the rebels even better.

I just wish there were some photographs of the library and these brave men. The text is impactful but the photos could have packed an extra wallop to the book. Of course, the actual book might include these missing elements.

Let's whisper a prayer for Syria. The citizens there have suffered enough. Also, let's be thankful for life's saving graces. There's a lot to learn from others' sufferings rather than only wallowing in our own. And let's take a look at some lines from the book. The first five quotes show how reading helps provide an escape from reality and the second five show what life under a seige is truly like.

1. "Reading as refuge. A page opening to the world when every door is locked."

2. "Words can’t heal physical wounds, but they have the power to soothe mental ones."

3. "Reading helps me think positively, chase away negative ideas. And that’s what we need most right now."

4. "From the ruins, a fortress of paper would arise."

5. "Novels have an advantage over nonfiction: they venture onto the paths of imagination, bypassing the highway of reality."

6. "We’ve learned to live with the idea that death is at the street corner..."

7. "Behind the courage of men can be found the suffering of women."

8. "The children born under the siege don’t even know what an apple looks like."

9. "Hunger is a weapon of war. A particularly effective weapon. It can’t be seen. But it slowly eats away at bodies. A destructive strategy perfectly calculated to control men through their stomachs."

10. "To tell ourselves that others, before us, lived through the same thing. In another country. Another context. But thanks to their accounts, I feel less vulnerable. I find an inner strength that pushes me forward..."