Get our Best Book Club Books of 2025 eBook!

Book Summary and Reviews of Those We Throw Away Are Diamonds by Mondiant Dogon

Those We Throw Away Are Diamonds by Mondiant Dogon

Those We Throw Away Are Diamonds

A Refugee's Search for Home

by Mondiant Dogon

  • Critics' Consensus (0):
  • Readers' Rating (1):
  • Published:
  • Oct 2021, 336 pages
  • Rate this book

About this book

Book Summary

A stunning and heartbreaking lens on the global refugee crisis, from a man who faced the very worst of humanity and survived to advocate for displaced people around the world.

One day when Mondiant Dogon, a Bagogwe Tutsi born in the Democratic Republic of Congo, was only three years old, his father's lifelong friend, a Hutu man, came to their home with a machete in his hand and warned the family they were to be killed within hours. Dogon's family fled into the forest, initiating a long and dangerous journey into Rwanda. They made their way to the first of several UN tent cities in which they would spend decades. But their search for a safe haven had just begun.

Hideous violence stalked them in the camps. Even though Rwanda famously has a former refugee for a president in Paul Kagame, refugees in that country face enormous prejudice and acute want. For much of his life, Dogon and his family ate barely enough to keep themselves from starving. He fled back to Congo in search of the better life that had been lost, but there he was imprisoned and left without any option but to become a child soldier.

For most refugees, the camp starts as an oasis but soon becomes quicksand, impossible to leave. Yet Dogon managed to be one of the few refugees he knew to go to college. Though he hid his status from his fellow students out of shame, eventually he would emerge as an advocate for his people.

Rarely do refugees get to tell their own stories. We see them only for a moment, if at all, in flight: Syrians winding through the desert; children searching a Greek shore for their parents; families gathered at the southern border of the United States. But through his writing, Dogon took control of his own narrative and spoke up for forever refugees everywhere.

As Dogon once wrote in a poem, "Those we throw away are diamonds."

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Reviews

Media Reviews

"A human rights activist remembers a childhood besieged by violence in Congo and Rwanda in this searing debut memoir...There is shocking suffering here, and Dogon conveys its psychological impact with limpid, subdued prose...The result is an immensely moving memorial to the Rwandan tragedy." - Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"An eloquent and necessary plea for compassion for war refugees everywhere...In a beautifully heartfelt, plainspoken account, a refugee from the Congo-Rwanda wars breaks his silence to reveal his family's story of fleeing their home amid unimaginable violence...Throughout, he delivers effectively vivid details of his life and culture, and it's clear that he is dedicated to helping others in similar terrible circumstances." - Kirkus (starred review)

"Throughout this memoir, Dogon shares stories about his family and their efforts to find safety. His plea is that the world does not forget the many refugees still living in stateless purgatory. Verdict: Those interested in international relations, immigration, and social work will find Dogon's firsthand account essential reading." - Library Journal

"A harrowing story told with wisdom and grace, in a crisp, sensory style that instantly transports. From the first page, my heart was in my mouth." - Dina Nayeri, author of The Ungrateful Refugee

"Mondiant Dogon takes us on a journey through a heartrending window into the lives of the humans that live in Congo, Rwanda and Gihembe. Besides the heartbreaking accounts in the story, Mondiant also gives us the positive and human stories that do exist in his story, his families and his fellow refugees. This book should be read world-wide to counter the rhetoric of refugees as nothing but helpless, unable to do anything for their lives. This book shows otherwise." - Abdi Nor Iftin, author of Call Me American

"This incandescent book will transform you. Those We Throw Away Are Diamonds offers an immersive, riveting look at one Bagogwe man's singular journey from war in Congo to safety, in which good and evil are relative when war offers no good choices to anyone, when safety is an illusion, and when forgiveness is fraught. It is an uncompromising study in colonial powers as the root cause of rising displacement after centuries of redrawing boundaries, fomenting ethnic crises, and robbing regions of natural resources. But even as it offers high-level, international context, the book remains focused on the people whose lives are destroyed by war and policies, by disinterest and pity. Mondiant Dogon writes the stories of his community with such candor, compassion, and love that they can never be erased. I know I will never forget them." - Jessica Goudeau, author of After the Last Border

This information about Those We Throw Away Are Diamonds was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

More Information

Mondiant Nshimiyimana Dogon is an author, human rights activist, and refugee ambassador. Born into a Congolese Tutsi family in Bagogwe tribe in North Kivu province, at age three he was forced to leave his home village, Bikenke, because of the Rwandan genocide against Tutsis that spilled over into the Democratic Republic of Congo. Since 1996 he has lived in refugee camps. Dogon holds a BA from the University of Rwanda and an MA in international education from New York University.

Jenna Krajeski is a reporter for The Fuller Project whose writing has appeared in the New Yorker, the New York Times, and the Nation, among other publications. She is the coauthor of Nobel laureate Nadia Murad's memoir, The Last Girl, and was a Knight-Wallace Fellow at the University of Michigan.

More Author Information

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

More Recommendations

Readers Also Browsed . . .

more biography/memoir...

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

BookBrowse Book Club

Book Jacket
The Devil Finds Work
by James Baldwin
A book-length essay on racism in American films, by "the best essayist in this country" (The New York Times Book Review).
Book Jacket
The Mysterious Bakery on Rue de Paris
by Evie Woods
From the million-copy bestselling author of The Lost Bookshop.
Book Jacket
The River Knows Your Name
by Kelly Mustian
A haunting Southern novel about memory and love, from the author of The Girls in the Stilt House.

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket

    Happy Land
    by Dolen Perkins-Valdez

    From the New York Times bestselling author, a novel about a family's secret ties to a vanished American Kingdom.

  • Book Jacket

    The Fairbanks Four
    by Brian Patrick O’Donoghue

    One murder, four guilty convictions, and a community determined to find justice.

  • Book Jacket

    The Seven O'Clock Club
    by Amelia Ireland

    Four strangers join an experimental treatment to heal broken hearts in Amelia Ireland's heartfelt debut novel.

  • Book Jacket

    One Death at a Time
    by Abbi Waxman

    A cranky ex-actress and her Gen Z sobriety sponsor team up to solve a murder that could send her back to prison in this dazzling mystery.

Who Said...

Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.

Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

A C on H S

and be entered to win..

Your guide toexceptional          books

BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.