Welcome to the New World

About the Author Jake Halpern is the author of Bad Paper, an Amazon Best Book of 2014, and Nightfall, one of a number of young adult novels. His journalism has appeared in the New Yorker, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Atlantic, among many other publications. He is also a contributor to NPR?s All Things Considered and This American Life and teaches journalism at Yale University in New Haven, where he lives.Michael Sloan is a printmaker and illustrator whose work appears regularly in the New York Times, the Washington Post, Christian Science Monitor, Boston Globe, and many other places. The Society of Illustrators has honored him with three silver medals for his illustrations. Sloan has lectured widely on his art and also shown his work in solo exhibition. He is also the creator of The Zen of Nimbus comic and he lives in New Haven. Product Description Now in a full-length book, the New York Times Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic story of a refugee family who fled the civil war in Syria to make a new life in AmericaAfter escaping a Syrian prison, Ibrahim Aldabaan and his family fled the country to seek protection in America. Among the few refugees to receive visas, they finally landed in JFK airport on November 8, 2016, Election Day. The family had reached a safe harbor, but woke up to the world of Donald Trump and a Muslim ban that would sever them from the grandmother, brothers, sisters, and cousins stranded in exile in Jordan.Welcome to the New World tells the Aldabaans? story. Resettled in Connecticut with little English, few friends, and even less money, the family of seven strive to create something like home. As a blur of language classes, job-training programs, and the fearsome first days of high school (with hijab) give way to normalcy, the Aldabaans are lulled into a sense of security. A white van cruising slowly past the house prompts some unease, which erupts into full terror when the family receives a death threat and is forced to flee and start all over yet again. The America in which the Aldabaans must make their way is by turns kind and ignorant, generous and cruel, uplifting and heartbreaking.Delivered with warmth and intimacy, Jake Halpern and Michael Sloan's Welcome to the New World is a wholly original view of the immigrant experience, revealing not only the trials and successes of one family but showing the spirit of a town and a country, for good and bad. Review "Engaging . . . intimate . . . Sloan and Halpern deliver a story that fully inhabits its comics form, and breathes with an easy visual elegance . . . This real-life story is remarkable."?Hillary Chute, The New York Times (Editors' Choice)"Powerful . . . Its granular, journalistic approach takes you to places rarely imagined in terms of the refugee experience . . . truly thought-provoking."?The Guardian"Moving . . . The Aldabaans cannot forget all they have lost, but [Welcome to the New World] also documents what they have gained." ?NPR "Perceptive . . . Halpern and Sloan?s smart use of humorous and heart-wrenching details particularize the family?s story while effectively conveying their political message. . . . For readers raised on Persepolis, this moving documentary portrait hits home." ?Publishers Weekly (starred review)"By turns heartbreaking and amusing, Welcome to the New World shows the bittersweet life the Aldabaans left behind and the pressure put on them to become independent within months of their arrival. . . . This is journalism at its finest." ?Booklist (starred review) "Moving . . . refreshingly tangible . . . An accessible, informative journey through complex issues during turbulent times."?Kirkus Reviews"Illuminating . . . Welcome is not always the response the Aldabaans encounter, but their resilience shines as they work to build the safety and security that will someday allow them to feel at home."?Shelf Awareness"Such a gripping story, filled with heartbreak and hope, about a family i