Rafik Schami’s novel is an incredibly easy read, but at the same time, the simplicity belies the real political issues at hand- State repression, freedom of the individual, and true liberty in one’s own heimat. Peppered with the most interesting characters, A Handful of Stars traverses the spaces and obliterates the borders of the nation to bring to the reader a kind of migrant reality that is full of hopes and dreams, as well as real dangers emanating from apparatuses of control and capture.