Mikael (Misha) Okuns runs the Behind the Bookstore coffee shop and has been a staple of caffeinated life in Edgartown since 2014.

This summer, he published a memoir that is about coffee and so much more. The story he tells involves his long and winding journey to America from his native Azerbaijan. The book is titled Stateless in Paradise: A Stranded Soul’s Fight for Freedom.

Misha grew up in the city of Baku, Azerbaijan (once a republic of the Soviet Union) with his mother, father and twin brother. After moving from Azerbaijan to Turkmenistan and then Armenia, he worked for a company that sent him to America to work as an interpreter for a government official of Turkmenistan. Deciding he wanted to stay in the U.S., Misha applied for asylum on the grounds that he had to escape the violent conflict at home between Azerbaijan and Armenia after the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991.

“I did not win the case, that’s when the judge gave me the deportation,” he said on a recent afternoon inside Edgartown Books. “I really did want to go, but when I arrived at the airport with my Soviet passport, I realized that I wouldn’t be allowed to board the plane because the passport was from a country that was being dissolved and so was not acceptable.”

Misha's memoir is titled Stateless in Paradise: A Stranded Soul’s Fight for Freedom.

Ray Ewing

Misha's memoir is titled Stateless in Paradise: A Stranded Soul’s Fight for Freedom.

Ray Ewing

Since he had left his home, the former Soviet Union had reverted back to Russia.

Having knowhere to go, he found himself placed in a U.S. deportation center before being allowed to leave. For a time he then lived in Los Angeles, where he began his love affair with coffee.

But his visa issues caught up with him while on vacation in American Samoa, where due to the ongoing uncertainty about the status of his citizenship, he remained in exile for over a year.

“I wasn’t born to know that I’m going to become stateless,” he said. “I wasn’t born stateless myself. I was born a citizen of the Soviet Union, a country that no longer exists.”

After Samoa, his journey took him to Puerto Rico and eventually to Martha’s Vineyard, where he has run the Behind the Bookstore Café ever since. He also received his United States citizenship five years ago.

When asked what he wants readers to take away from his story, he thought for a moment.

“I really hope that people will embark on the journey of the stateless person,” he said. “Open their hearts to the resilience of the human spirit because a lot of us take citizenship for granted, but there are people who don’t have this, who were born stateless or found themselves there. It’s a struggle.”

“All I’m trying to do is help other stateless people and refugees,” he added.

Misha added how thankful he is for the people around him who were constant sources of positivity.

“Deep gratitude goes to Jeffrey Sudikoff, owner of Behind the Bookstore Café, whose encouragement gave me the push I needed to start writing and whose support over 11 seasons at the café changed my life,” he said.

Stateless in Paradise: A Stranded Soul’s Fight for Freedom is available at online retailers and Edgartown Books and Bunch of Grapes.