What Is the What

This book, written by Dave Eggers, tells the true story of a young Sudanese boy, Achak Deng, who has to flee his village because of the civil war between northern and southern Sudan. Achak was one of the thousands of « Lost Boys » who became refugees first in Ethiopia and then in Kenya.

This is a terrible story but it is also told with kindness and humour and from the adorable point of view of this very young boy who loses everything and dreams of a better life for himself and his friends. It took me a while to get through the entire book, but I had to read the last 150 pages in one sitting because that’s when Achak is finally sponsored to go to the US. His last few days in Kenya are just unbelievable!

I found the title strange, at first, but the story explains what it means early on. We are then left wondering what the answer to the question will be until the very end, when, after an extremely difficult 24 hours, Achak finally tells us what he finally understands the answer to be.

I learned a lot about Sudan in this book! For example, I didn’t know that the south was mostly inhabited by Christians and the north was where Muslims lived. The book doesn’t focus much on historical facts, since the story is told from the perspective of this young, barely educated boy, so I kept checking things out on Wikipedia to understand better what was going on.

This was a wonderful book that all our adolescents should read in school to understand how the world really works, how money and power don’t care about anyone, and how lucky we really are to live the privileged lives we live.