A review by stephxsu
The Boat People by Sharon Bala

3.0

An important tale to be told, but I struggled to get emotionally invested. The changes in narrative perspectives and even timelines across chapters was necessary to understand the conflict, the horrors that drove the Tamil refugees to attempt such a dangerous sea crossing to Canada, and the Canadian polite climate of the time, which mired these 500+ refugees in months of legal BS. I also appreciated how this book acknowledged the harm that other minorities, even those that have themselves been harmed by and/or ultimately benefited from Canada's immigration policy, can become complicit in the dehumanizing process of policing migrants. But none of the characters really grew much over the course of the book. The result was that the book felt a bit tedious and overly long.