Road Before Me Weeps

About this book

"Several million refugees and migrants set out for Europe from 2014 to 2018, spurred by war and chaos in Syria and Iraq, violence in Afghanistan, and hopelessness in countries bordering war zones. In 2015 and 2016 the western Balkans, from Turkey through Greece, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Serbia and Hungary, was their main entry point. As a BBC correspondent based in Budapest for more than three decades, Nick Thorpe was perfectly placed to cover the birth of the route, its heyday, and the attempts of numerous states to close it ever since. This is his intimate portrait of the daily lives of those stuck in razor-wire enclosures or on the move, along forest tracks, railway lines, motorways - and of the smugglers, border police and political leaders who help, exploit or obstruct them. In this eye-opening account, Thorpe challenges those who demonise or glorify migration, visits their arrivals in their new environment, and studies their impact on the countries that welcomed them with open arms or with hesitations"--from inside cover.