''A Hope More Powerful than the Sea'' is a book by

Melissa Fleming Melissa Ruth Fleming is an American journalist, author, and United Nations official. She has been head of the United Nations Department of Global Communications since 2019. She is the author of '' A Hope More Powerful than the Sea.'' Education ...

about Syrian refugee

Doaa Al Zamel Doaa Al Zamel (born 1994 or 1995 in Daraa, Syria) is a Syrian refugee and one of 11 survivors of the 2014 Malta migrant shipwreck that killed approximately 500 people. In 2012, fleeing the Syria civil war, Al Zamel's family moved to Egypt, wher ...

's experiences leading up to and during the 2014 Malta migrant shipwreck.

Production

''A Hope More Powerful than the Sea'' was published by

Fleet Fleet may refer to: Vehicles *Fishing fleet *Naval fleet *Fleet vehicles, a pool of motor vehicles *Fleet Aircraft, the aircraft manufacturing company Places Canada *Fleet, Alberta, Canada, a hamlet England * The Fleet Lagoon, at Chesil Beach, ...

in 2017. It was written by Melissa Fleming, the chief spokesperson for

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is a United Nations agency mandated to aid and protect refugees, forcibly displaced communities, and stateless people, and to assist in their voluntary repatriation, local integrati ...

Synopsis

The book starts with

's early life, growing up in

Daraa Daraa ( ar, دَرْعَا, Darʿā, Levantine Arabic: , also Darʿā, Dara’a, Deraa, Dera'a, Dera, Derʿā and Edrei; means "''fortress''", compare Dura-Europos) is a city in southwestern Syria, located about north of the border with Jordan ...

, Syria. Al Zamel has a happy childhood, living in the extended family home, until the Syrian civil war breaks out. Her family flee to Egypt where she gets engaged to Bassam. In Egypt, Bassam and Al Zamel pay people smugglers to move them to Europe, boarding a boat with 500 other refugees. The boat capsizes in the

Mediterranean Sea The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the ea ...

, with all but eleven of the passengers drowning. Bassam does not make it, Al Zamel is one of the eleven.

Critical reception

Jenny Sawyer writing in ''

The Christian Science Monitor ''The Christian Science Monitor'' (''CSM''), commonly known as ''The Monitor'', is a nonprofit news organization that publishes daily articles in electronic format as well as a weekly print edition. It was founded in 1908 as a daily newspaper ...

'' credit's Fleming's ability to tell the personal story and frame it in the wider refugee crisis, but also notes the lack of Al Zamel's own voice, the story only ever being told by the third party narrator. Hannah Solel writing in the ''

Financial Times The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and published digitally that focuses on business and economic current affairs. Based in London, England, the paper is owned by a Japanese holding company, Nik ...

'' called the book gripping and moving.

Screen adaption

Steven Spielberg Steven Allan Spielberg (; born December 18, 1946) is an American director, writer, and producer. A major figure of the New Hollywood era and pioneer of the modern blockbuster, he is the most commercially successful director of all time. Spie ...

bought the rights to the book, but production stopped after the producers received media backlash in 2018 for commissioning white American writer and actor

Lena Dunham Lena Dunham (, born May 13, 1986) is an American writer, director, actress, and producer. She is known as the creator, writer, and star of the HBO television series ''Girls'' (2012–2017), for which she received several Emmy Award nominations a ...

for penning the script, accused them of whitewashing.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hope More Powerful than the Sea 2017 non-fiction books Works about wars Books about refugees Books about Syria Books about war