A Greek Tragedy
The gripping true story of a devastating shipwreck during the biggest refugee crisis since World War II.
On October 28, 2015, a boat meant for only a few dozen passengers, capsized off the coast of the Greek island of Lesvos. Hundreds of refugees, forced in desperation onto the overloaded boat manned by armed smugglers, were tossed into a roiling sea. The resulting loss of life, the largest in a single day during the crisis in the Aegean, shocked the world.
Now, after nearly a decade of research, interviews, and investigation, reporter Jeanne Carstensen has captured the dramatic twenty-four hours—including details of the refugees’ lives before they left their homes to the courageous rescue efforts of the Greek islanders and volunteers rushing to help, even as their government and the EU failed to act. Carstensen brilliantly showcases the extraordinary heroism of ordinary people in extreme circumstances.
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In a world where forced migration is on the rise, A Greek Tragedy challenges us to confront our collective humanity. It’s an unforgettable testament of our times and a compassionate depiction of the lengths to which a person will go to save another human being.
Coming March 25, 2025
from Simon & Schuster/One Signal
Publishers Weekly Starred Review
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Praise for A Greek Tragedy
“Alternately in the news and ignored, the refugee crisis is a permanent, painful part of our era. Jeanne Carstensen reminds us that there are well over 100 million displaced people in the world. Through a deep look into one tragic shipwreck, she vividly brings alive survivors, victims and helpers in a way that stands for the larger tragedy of which this event was a part."
– Adam Hochschild, bestselling author of King Leopold’s Ghost
"A Greek Tragedy is a gripping, engrossing page-turner. Through meticulous reporting, Carstensen writes an unflinching look at one memorable day in the massive migration crisis and the impossible, life-or-death choices faced by everyone involved. These searing stories will stay with me."
— Jessica Goudeau, author of After the Last Border
"A gripping reconstruction that illuminates the individual lives brought together by a fatal shipwreck. Carstensen's skillful reporting shows us how love and courage survive in the face of disaster."
– Matthieu Aikins, author of The Naked Don’t Fear The Water
"An extraordinary account of a devastating tragedy. This meticulously reported book details not only the 2015 shipwreck that killed dozens of asylum seekers en route to Greece, but the lives of the survivors, the dead, and the rescue workers who took great risks to save them. This is the story of a single catastrophe at sea, but also a window into the savagery of borders writ large, and their tremendous human costs."
– Lauren Markham, author of A Map of Future Ruins and The Faraway Brothers
“With dogged reporting and great humanity, Jeanne Carstensen has written a powerful epic of ordinary people thrust into a border-crossing drama of survival. A Greek Tragedy is a gripping, heart-wrenching tale with a huge cast, and it is essential reading for anyone hoping to understand the migrations and the injustices of our modern world."
— Héctor Tobar, best-selling author of Our Migrant Souls and Deep Down Dark
"Like any Greek tragedy, Jeanne Carstensen’s book puts us face to face with our mortal selves ... and ... exposes to us the full spectrum of our humanness, in all of its ambition and love and generosity and apathy and greed: for it is not Olympian gods but the callous men and women in power at whose behest we live and die. At the time of the greatest human migration in recent history, A Greek Tragedy—tender, unsparing, meticulously researched—is an unparalleled chronicle.”
– Anna Badkhen, author of Bright Unbearable Reality
"A Greek Tragedy is the gripping account of a horrid maritime disaster, a beguiling saga, and an unputdownable book. This is meticulously researched, masterful reporting."