The following version was used to make this guide: Jamieson, Victoria and Omar Mohamed. When Stars Are Scattered. New York, New York: Dial Books for Young Readers, 2020. This young adult graphic memoir includes three parts, a short pre-introduction before Chapter 1, then 17 chapters in total, but for the purposes of this guide is broken into six parts.

The memoir begins with a night sky filled with stars and the text: “For me, the first years are lost” (3). The next page is Omar and Hassan looking through a fence, Omar saying she is not there, Hassan responding, “Hooyo” (5). They walk home to where they live - A2 block - next to their foster mother Fatuma. Chapter 1 then starts as Omar explains that he and his brother Hassan live in a refugee camp in Dadaab, Kenya. They were born in Somalia but left seven years ago in fear for their lives. He explains how it is his job to protect his brother. He then plays soccer with his best friend Jeri and the other boys when they come home from school.

One day a man named Salan approaches Omar and talks to him about going to school, but at first Omar is afraid because he does not want to leave Hassan all day. He also thinks he does not need school, because he will go back to Somalia, or he will be relocated to the United States. Salan tells him he should give Hassan some independence and explains that Omar is like one grain of sand in the desert as a refugee - among many hundreds of thousands of refugees. Salan comes back with a pencil and notebook, saying Omar can start fifth grade the next day.

Omar starts school, despite his guilt over leaving Hassan all day, and it is hard but exhilarating. All the classes are in English, which he does not speak yet. He struggles between school and getting all his chores done. He realizes though that this is what the girls face unfairly - as they are expected to do all the chores for their families. Salan offers him private English lessons, which help, but Omar is still tired and hungry all the time. Finally one day it is distribution day and Omar takes his ration card to get his and Hassan’s rations for the next 15 days. Suddenly he thinks he sees his mother and he and Hassan sprint through all the people, only to realize it is someone else. He cries to Fatuma, asking why their mother did not come with them.

The kids have a month-long vacation from school, and they play games together into the night. Jeri challenges Omar to empower Hassan more as a disabled person and not underestimate him. Omar also spends more time with Maryam and Nimo, the two smartest girls in school. Omar also overhears from one of Fatuma’s friends that his home village has been destroyed. Back from vacation, Omar realizes school is his best chance at future. He starts studying for the exam that will decide if he can continue attending school, but one day his brother is beaten up badly and he has to stay home with him. Maryam, who has been forced into an early marriage and cannot go to school anymore, tells Omar she will watch Hassan and he can take the exam. Part 1 ends as Omar starts his exam.

Part 2 begins two years later, Omar is now in middle school. He wants to be a UN social worker when he grows up. One of Omar’s friends is picked from the list for an interview with the UN to go to America and Omar starts to get jealous. Ramadan passes with a big community celebration for Iftar and he and Jeri make some money selling orange drink. One day, a UN worker named Susana comes to Omar’s class and speaks to Omar afterwards, saying she wants to be his friend and will watch his progress. Soon after, Omar and Hassan are put on the UN list, and chosen for an interview with the UN and they sleep overnight outside the office to make sure they do not miss their interview.

During the interview, Omar tells the officer through an interpreter the story of his childhood - watching men murder his father in front of him at their home, then his mother telling him and Hassan to run to the neighbors. They walked for days and weeks until they were exhausted, thin, sick and dehydrated, arriving in Dadaab and sent to the hospital. After the interview the officer tells him it might be a few months until he hears back about a second interview. Meanwhile, Nimo and her family are chosen to resettle in Canada, but as time passes, Omar does not hear back from the UN.

Part 3 begins four years later, Omar is now 17 and has passed his exams so he can go to high school. One night one of their goats dies suddenly and Hassan is distraught by everyone crying and runs away. Omar searches all night for him, finding him in another camp with a family, who has a daughter named Sarura. He returns to the camp the next day to find out that he and Hassan have been put back on the UN list for a second interview. They go in for several more interviews until finally both he and Hassan are selected for resettlement to the United States. As he and Hassan leave the camp, the only home they have known, he can only think of one word - Hassan’s only word he can say - which means mother. The memoir ends as he and Hassan get to the airport and board the plane, with Maryam’s poem about stars and fate in captions around them. The last quote of the memoir is “for me the first years are lost. I hope that in America, Hassan and I will find our way” (257).