A. Hartinger, Brent. THE GEOGRAPHY CLUB. New York: Harper Tempest, 2003.
B. PLOT SUMMARY:
THE GEOGRAPHY CLUB is a story of a group of teens who are gay, lesbian, and bisexual. Russel is the main character. He is in the closet except for nighttime forays on the internet. While iMing someone his own age that happened to go to his high school they decide to meet. Russ risks the inherent because he is lonely and tired of being misunderstood. The boys are shocked when later that same night Russel and Kevin meet. Kevin being the superstar baseball and all a round sports jock of the school was a happy surprise for Kevin who had tried to keep his eyes diverted when changing in the locker room after a group shower. Russel’s best friends are Gunner and Min. Min turns out to be bisexual and her female partner is also a student at their school. The friends of friends get together, Min, Russel, Kevin, Ike and Terese, Min’s partner. They are all shocked and amazed that they are not the only teen at school with a different sexual orientation. The club officially organizes and selects a teacher who will not really be a faculty adviser or meet with him. Soon he even gives them a key to his room where they conduct meetings. They fill out the necessary paperwork and call their support group “The Geography Club” they chose the name of the group because they thought it sounded so boring and geeky that no one else would attempt to join. (They are not so lucky after a while) I remember high school clubs meeting once a month but this group decides to meet twice a week on Tuesdays and Thursdays. They have to start their meeting promptly because Terese is as much a jock or should I say as much of an athlete as Kevin. Russel struggles with being dragged into one double date and then two so his friend Gunner can date the other girl’s friend. Kimberly doesn’t care for Gunner at all. She’s doing this so her friend Trish, who has the hots for Kevin can have some time to go out and some time to be alone with him. Russel has kiss number one from Trish and then kiss number two on the next date as Trish tries to get him to have sex with her as they “borrow” Gunner’s car. The girls are wild and crazy. Trish carries condoms in her purse (so I salute her for being responsible). Russel tells Trish he’s a virgin and always wanted the first time to be special. That is endearing to Trish who is not use to guys like Kevin. Russel is so upset when he gets home from the date. One of Russel’s problems is that he is just too nice so he goes to many places that he doesn’t want to go. Kevin meets Russel at the gazebo and they talk through the date. Russ figures Kevin has been chased by girl after girl because he is very handsome and a sports star. Kevin sympathizes with Russ after the date. For one tiny moment as Trish pursues Russ sexually in the parked car she has the “you’re not gay are you?” chat with him. It didn’t seem like a quick harmless question to Russ so he confides in Kevin.
“Man that really sucks. Trish sounds like a real bitch.” Russ answers in the negative and comments, “She just wanted what everyone wants. I just didn’t want it with her.” Kevin and Russ have their first shy and tender kiss that night and we witness the social and sexual relationship between Min and Terese ebb and flow and what happens to “The Geography Club” when an African American girl with a bright orange shirt and headband and smiley face earrings comes to join a “real” club. Her father is a cartographer and this is an unexpected intrusion to the plans of the other “Geography Club” members.
C. CRITICAL ANALYSIS (WITH CULTURAL MARKERS)
The book has lots going for it even though some of the plot line is a bit too improbable to make you believe it entirely. Author Brent Hartinger is a gay writer from Washington State so he speaks with authority and authenticity.
I like the fact that the characters are first just seen as ordinary high school kids who are in cliques, get bored easily and are full of teenage angst. Their sexuality doesn’t not define them totally, but yet it does. Hartinger does a great job of showing well rounded characters, a relationship with a parent, who has the wheels for adventures and other things any teen would have experience with. Russel, Min, and Gunter have always eaten together in the cafeteria each day. Now the club wants to eat together but they realize that isn’t wise. This is totally realistic that new friends that happen to be gay, that meet and confess their orientation to each other, would be more easily identified if they all hung out only with each other.
I liked Kevin and Terese being athletes. That’s something that so many people in our culture do not realize, that military employees, cops, Olympic athletes, prissy females and even Republicans :o) can be gay. I believe Hartinger is trying to point out in the novel that anyone anywhere might possibly be gay, from the minister to the heartthrob in a soap opera. There was very little focus on the physical attributes of the gay characters except that Russ thought Kevin was cute and Terese worried that she looked a little “butch.”
I thought the book did a very good job of humanizing the characters and making them believable while avoiding stereotypes. It would be a healthy book for a middle or high schooler, gay or straight to read. It is a quick read and a book I really didn’t want to put down. It reads like many realistic young adult fiction, the setting is suburban. A really funny and believable part of the story was Russel getting ready for his first date with Trish. He doesn’t want to go. He’s mad at himself for letting Gunner talk him into this, but still he wants to look nice. He agonizes over his clothes and stares at himself in the mirror to see which angle makes him look coolest in his underwear. First I think of an ancient Tom Cruise move where he slides across the floor in his sock feet looking cool and then I think of listening to Augustan Burroughs narrating his life story in RUNNING WITH SCISSORS and that is a more probable comparison.
I applaud Brent Hartinger for avoiding plastic figures just to make a point. Being gay himself gives him a voice rarely heard in the world of children’s literature. Russel nor Kevin are not smokers, they do not lift their pinkies when they drink and they are noteffeminate. Kevin is into his appearance as much or a bit more than one would expect a high school boy to be. The “bad girls” are a bit stereotyped a bit too hardened, but there are certainly young ladies that are total bitches, looking for a free screw, and love to send food back at restaurants; just anything to get attention. There are many females of all ages who are more interested in sex than their male counterparts.
THE GEOGRAPHY CLUB reads like a typical teen drama that is better than most. The characterization is good and the story rings true. The only part I found a bit unbelievable is that within a few days 5 people at the same high school suddenly “discover” each other. The dialogue sounds extremely natural and not forced. Teenagers don’t want to stand out in a crowd and Hartinger’s characters are no exception to that rule. The reading level has a 4th or 5th grade feel to me and the size of the book and type make this look like it is for preteens. Being a high interest-low vocabulary book might be a possibility here. The volume comes to fill a large niche that has been waiting to be filled. I enjoyed the Geography Club. I am on hold for the sequel. The theme of the book is coming to terms with being gay but it serves as a lesson that we all must learn to accept ourselves no matter what society tells us. As the club “outs” our author has first rate knowledge of forming support groups of tolerance for young people because he formed such an organization in his hometown of Tacoma, Washington.
D. REVIEW EXCERPTS:
School Library Journal characterizes this as a Grade 10 and up selection. I vehemently disagree with that. My regular young customers at the public library and my former ones in the media center could easily read the volume in elementary and middle school. It has a much lower reading level than Harry Potter for example.
SLJ does agree with me however about the book’s merits, “The club members relish the opportunity to discuss their lives and to relate to one another openly and honestly. Eventually, however, intense peer pressure and insecurity take their toll. Russel's relationship with Kevin ends, but the "Geography Club" becomes the "Goodkind High School Gay-Straight-Bisexual Alliance,"
Booklist sees this as a 7-12 grader novel. Obviously the topic is for older children but the white space and type size betray that fact. Booklist goes on to say, “for a short time, life is blissful. Russel has friends with whom he can be himself, and he also makes love with Kevin. Then things fall apart. Russel refuses to have sex with a girl, and word gets out that he's gay. Kevin can't come out, so he and Russel break up. Things are settled a little too neatly in the end, but there's no sermonizing. With honest talk of love and cruelty, friendship and betrayal, it's Russel's realistic, funny, contemporary narrative that makes this first novel special. The dialogue is right on; so is the high-school cafeteria; so is the prejudice. Booktalk this. (Now wouldn’t that be something!)
Reviews accessed from:
http://www.amazon.com/Geography-Club-Brent-Hartinger/dp/0060012234/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/103-7575722-4136600?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1186626980&sr=1-1
E. CONNECTIONS:
The first books that come to mind are from different YA authors who share the last name of Frank.
E.R. Frank’s AMERICA is a poignant, realistic novel that looks at the issues of being different and stereotypes but AMERICA has more depth and for a little bit more mature student.
The other is Hillary Frank’s BETTER THAN RUNNING AT NIGHT which deals with first love, betrayal, growing up. Hillary’s book to is a bit more ripened than Hartinger’s and the main character is a freshman in college.
Wednesday, August 8, 2007
Saturday, August 4, 2007
LS 5903 MULTICULTURAL LITERATURE
Review of Habibi
A. Nye, Naomi Shihab. HABIBI. New York: Simon Pulse, 1997.
B. PLOT SUMMARY:
This is the story of Liyana and her brother, Rafik. Their father, Mr. Abboud is an Arab American. He meets his wife and decides to remain in the U.S. unlike he originally planned when he completed medical school. The kids have heard distant rumblings about going to live in Jerusalem since they were very young but they never took it too seriously. As Liyana gets ready to enter high school and her brother to enter middle school, Dr. Abboud sees this a perfect time to return to Palestine. Liyana has just received her first kiss and she does not want to move. We watch the family pack 17 suitcases and sell or leave everything else they own. A family of 4 with 17 suitcases is rather sparse when you think about it and of course they couldn’t bring along a pet. The story is Liyana’s story of how she was content with being a “half Arab” young American girl with a mother’s ancestry that’s not even mentioned it leads me to think it was her character was so “European” or “Caucasian” that it was not discussed except to show the stark differences of the parent’s cultural heritage. Liyana learns to relax with the new customs that people smell, bath, and live in different circumstances than she is used to. She attends an Armenian school and embraces learning their language and customs. Finally Liyana learns to spend time with her grandmother Sitti. Sitti teaches Liyana how to make flatbread, how she carries water on her head. When visiting a spice shop of an acquaintance a Jewish man stops in the shop because he believes by her appearance that Liyana is Jewish and he tells her she should associate and shop with her own kind. In the end Liyana comes up with the ultimate test for her family, her friends, and her safety. She falls in love with a Jewish boy that lives on “the other side” of Jerusalem.
C. CRITICAL ANALYSIS (INCLUDING CULTURAL MARKERS)
I believe the author did an excellent job of writing a page turner no matter the subject of the story. The subject though is very interesting and thought provoking. What would it be like for an American family whose children are 50% Arab to live in Jerusalem near a very large extended family? Liyana is so very “Americanized” being born and raised into an upper middle class family even though she has an Arab father. It appears that Liyana and Rafik have never really imagined or had a desire to visit, much less stay in the land of their father. It is a rather poignant story and there is great care in portraying the relationship of the sister and brother.
Daily life circumstances are portrayed very realistically but non-judgmentally. A lamb has been slaughtered to welcome the “return” of their own and to meet his family. Liyana and her mother go to market for chicken meat. They are both wary. Mrs. Abboud lets the butcher select the chicken, she certainly doesn’t want to. The details of the kill are minute. The picking the chick out of the cage by her claws, quickly swinging the chicken upside down until the chicken goes limp from shock. Then the twisting of the neck and severing of the head as the body gives a final twitch. Liyana does not help eat the chicken and becomes a vegetarian right at that moment in the market. Liyana’s mother tries to learn to accept that this is the way things are now and so to get meat for her family she goes to an open air market with the bloody butcher with a cleaver and dripping apron..
As much as this is a “multicultural” story it is also a coming of age story. Relationships between brother and sister, mother and father are essential elements of the story. The story is neutral and objective about the differences in the Arab and American culture and lifestyle. Liyana’s father is the ultimate tourist as they leave their home in the Midwest to travel and travel to New York and then their first days in Jerusalem. Liyana’s mother gets tears in her eyes as she traces the walk to Golgotha of Christ. Liyana’s father asks her if she’s ever thought of praying like that Arab Muslim they pass who is kneeling on a mat and kisses his forehead to the ground. Liyana’s Dad worries that his elderly mother has been living for the opportunity to make a pilgrimage to Mecca most of her life. With Liyana’s Dad able to foot the bill for her transportation she makes plans. Liyana’s father tells of his concern that after Sitti accomplishes this life goal that at her advanced age she may unconsciously think she has nothing left to live for and may decline in mind and spirit.
Liyana is portrayed as a sensitive adolescent prone to writing in her journal, reluctant to leave her friends and her old way of life. There is a scene in the book that is very profound. Mr. Abboud’s oldest brother is a part of the welcoming party and lives close to the rest of the extended family. Their 2nd day in Jerusalem brings Liyana’s uncle begging for her hand in marriage for his son her cousin. Liyana’s father is furious and lets his brother know in no uncertain terms that his immediate family and himself view that particular custom archaic, barbaric, and insensitive. The tension of the region and it’s people is depicted in a fair minded way. There are good Jews, bad Arabs, good merchants and sly ones. Liyana has a very profound and unusual experience to belong to:
1. Middle Class America
2. The Arab side of Jerusalem and Israel
3. Armenian academic and religious customs
4. And a visitor to the Jewish sections of her new city
The book talks of Ramalah, an actual city in the Arab world. Readers might recognize the name because so many military bases and western elements have developed there. During the first Gulf War it was a critical base for the American military. The dangers of the city, eating dinner outside are all mentioned in a realistic manner. Again however the book just tells a story of a considerate husband who rides the bus into his work at the hospital so his wife can drive the car on market day. The parents puzzle and interview and discuss with great care which school each of the children will attend just as an American family of their stature would do in the U.S. They still have the same actions in Jerusalem. Liyana and Rifak have never met their Father’s family so allowing several weeks before Liyana is comfortable spending time alone with her Grandmother Sitti learning the “lessons of women” is logical. There is no condemnation in the story from either family about how the “other side” has lived. Mr. Abboud is so excited about returning and thrilled to be back “home” that he initially doesn’t understand how awkward and nervous his children are.
Very well written. A page turner. Adolescents will like the story because of the accurate portrayal of teenage angst, relationships between the sexes and family traditions. Liyana is portrayed as having dark hair, long and oft times braided. It mentions the beautiful skin tone she has that is lighter than her father and darker than her mother. She and Rafik have more of an olive complexion. 80 customers have given thought provoking reviews and it retains 4 stars. It obviously resonates with many people.
Depicting the realities of daily violence in the Middle East, the sharp differences in customs and behavior such as males and females are never kiss on the mouth until they are married, and the stiff enforcement of traditions that are many times at odds. The book was a great story on its own merit but a positive depiction of live in Modern day America and then in Modern day Jerusalem.
D. Praise from School Library Journal:
From School Library Journal
Grade 5-9. An important first novel from a distinguished anthologist and poet. When Liyana's doctor father, a native Palestinian, decides to move his contemporary Arab-American family back to Jerusalem from St. Louis, 14-year-old Liyana is unenthusiastic. Arriving in Jerusalem, the girl and her family are gathered in by their colorful, warmhearted Palestinian relatives and immersed in a culture where only tourists wear shorts and there is a prohibition against boy/girl relationships. When Liyana falls in love with Omer, a Jewish boy, she challenges family, culture, and tradition, but her homesickness fades. Constantly lurking in the background of the novel is violence between Palestinian and Jew. It builds from minor bureaucratic annoyances and humiliations, to the surprisingly shocking destruction of grandmother's bathroom by Israeli soldiers, to a bomb set off in a Jewish marketplace by Palestinians. It exacts a reprisal in which Liyana's friend is shot and her father jailed. Nye introduces readers to unforgettable characters. The setting is both sensory and tangible: from the grandmother's village to a Bedouin camp. Above all, there is Jerusalem itself, where ancient tensions seep out of cracks and Liyana explores the streets practicing her Arabic vocabulary. Though the story begins at a leisurely pace, readers will be engaged by the characters, the romance, and the foreshadowed danger. Poetically imaged and leavened with humor, the story renders layered and complex history understandable through character and incident. Habibi succeeds in making the hope for peace compellingly personal and concrete...as long as individual citizens like Liyana's grandmother Sitti can say, "I never lost my peace inside."?Kate McClelland, Perrot Memorial Library, Greenwich, CT
Mentioned in the New York Times Book Review:
The New York Times Book Review, Karen Leggett
Adolescence magnifies the joys and anxieties of growing up even as it radically simplifies the complexities of the adult world. The poet and anthologist Naomi Shibab Nye is meticulously sensitive to this rainbow of emotion in her autobiographical novel, Habibi…. Habibi gives a reader all the sweet richness of a Mediterranean dessert, while leaving some of the historic complexities open to interpretation. (Ages 10 and older
Reviews accessed at: http://www.amazon.com/Habibi-Naomi-Shihab-Nye/dp/0689825234/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/103-7575722-4136600?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1186287566&sr=1-1
E. Connections:
Nye has written another wonderful book entitled; SITTI’S SECRET. It is for children a bit younger. Nye has also published a volume of poetry, THE FLAG OF CHILDHOOD
A. Nye, Naomi Shihab. HABIBI. New York: Simon Pulse, 1997.
B. PLOT SUMMARY:
This is the story of Liyana and her brother, Rafik. Their father, Mr. Abboud is an Arab American. He meets his wife and decides to remain in the U.S. unlike he originally planned when he completed medical school. The kids have heard distant rumblings about going to live in Jerusalem since they were very young but they never took it too seriously. As Liyana gets ready to enter high school and her brother to enter middle school, Dr. Abboud sees this a perfect time to return to Palestine. Liyana has just received her first kiss and she does not want to move. We watch the family pack 17 suitcases and sell or leave everything else they own. A family of 4 with 17 suitcases is rather sparse when you think about it and of course they couldn’t bring along a pet. The story is Liyana’s story of how she was content with being a “half Arab” young American girl with a mother’s ancestry that’s not even mentioned it leads me to think it was her character was so “European” or “Caucasian” that it was not discussed except to show the stark differences of the parent’s cultural heritage. Liyana learns to relax with the new customs that people smell, bath, and live in different circumstances than she is used to. She attends an Armenian school and embraces learning their language and customs. Finally Liyana learns to spend time with her grandmother Sitti. Sitti teaches Liyana how to make flatbread, how she carries water on her head. When visiting a spice shop of an acquaintance a Jewish man stops in the shop because he believes by her appearance that Liyana is Jewish and he tells her she should associate and shop with her own kind. In the end Liyana comes up with the ultimate test for her family, her friends, and her safety. She falls in love with a Jewish boy that lives on “the other side” of Jerusalem.
C. CRITICAL ANALYSIS (INCLUDING CULTURAL MARKERS)
I believe the author did an excellent job of writing a page turner no matter the subject of the story. The subject though is very interesting and thought provoking. What would it be like for an American family whose children are 50% Arab to live in Jerusalem near a very large extended family? Liyana is so very “Americanized” being born and raised into an upper middle class family even though she has an Arab father. It appears that Liyana and Rafik have never really imagined or had a desire to visit, much less stay in the land of their father. It is a rather poignant story and there is great care in portraying the relationship of the sister and brother.
Daily life circumstances are portrayed very realistically but non-judgmentally. A lamb has been slaughtered to welcome the “return” of their own and to meet his family. Liyana and her mother go to market for chicken meat. They are both wary. Mrs. Abboud lets the butcher select the chicken, she certainly doesn’t want to. The details of the kill are minute. The picking the chick out of the cage by her claws, quickly swinging the chicken upside down until the chicken goes limp from shock. Then the twisting of the neck and severing of the head as the body gives a final twitch. Liyana does not help eat the chicken and becomes a vegetarian right at that moment in the market. Liyana’s mother tries to learn to accept that this is the way things are now and so to get meat for her family she goes to an open air market with the bloody butcher with a cleaver and dripping apron..
As much as this is a “multicultural” story it is also a coming of age story. Relationships between brother and sister, mother and father are essential elements of the story. The story is neutral and objective about the differences in the Arab and American culture and lifestyle. Liyana’s father is the ultimate tourist as they leave their home in the Midwest to travel and travel to New York and then their first days in Jerusalem. Liyana’s mother gets tears in her eyes as she traces the walk to Golgotha of Christ. Liyana’s father asks her if she’s ever thought of praying like that Arab Muslim they pass who is kneeling on a mat and kisses his forehead to the ground. Liyana’s Dad worries that his elderly mother has been living for the opportunity to make a pilgrimage to Mecca most of her life. With Liyana’s Dad able to foot the bill for her transportation she makes plans. Liyana’s father tells of his concern that after Sitti accomplishes this life goal that at her advanced age she may unconsciously think she has nothing left to live for and may decline in mind and spirit.
Liyana is portrayed as a sensitive adolescent prone to writing in her journal, reluctant to leave her friends and her old way of life. There is a scene in the book that is very profound. Mr. Abboud’s oldest brother is a part of the welcoming party and lives close to the rest of the extended family. Their 2nd day in Jerusalem brings Liyana’s uncle begging for her hand in marriage for his son her cousin. Liyana’s father is furious and lets his brother know in no uncertain terms that his immediate family and himself view that particular custom archaic, barbaric, and insensitive. The tension of the region and it’s people is depicted in a fair minded way. There are good Jews, bad Arabs, good merchants and sly ones. Liyana has a very profound and unusual experience to belong to:
1. Middle Class America
2. The Arab side of Jerusalem and Israel
3. Armenian academic and religious customs
4. And a visitor to the Jewish sections of her new city
The book talks of Ramalah, an actual city in the Arab world. Readers might recognize the name because so many military bases and western elements have developed there. During the first Gulf War it was a critical base for the American military. The dangers of the city, eating dinner outside are all mentioned in a realistic manner. Again however the book just tells a story of a considerate husband who rides the bus into his work at the hospital so his wife can drive the car on market day. The parents puzzle and interview and discuss with great care which school each of the children will attend just as an American family of their stature would do in the U.S. They still have the same actions in Jerusalem. Liyana and Rifak have never met their Father’s family so allowing several weeks before Liyana is comfortable spending time alone with her Grandmother Sitti learning the “lessons of women” is logical. There is no condemnation in the story from either family about how the “other side” has lived. Mr. Abboud is so excited about returning and thrilled to be back “home” that he initially doesn’t understand how awkward and nervous his children are.
Very well written. A page turner. Adolescents will like the story because of the accurate portrayal of teenage angst, relationships between the sexes and family traditions. Liyana is portrayed as having dark hair, long and oft times braided. It mentions the beautiful skin tone she has that is lighter than her father and darker than her mother. She and Rafik have more of an olive complexion. 80 customers have given thought provoking reviews and it retains 4 stars. It obviously resonates with many people.
Depicting the realities of daily violence in the Middle East, the sharp differences in customs and behavior such as males and females are never kiss on the mouth until they are married, and the stiff enforcement of traditions that are many times at odds. The book was a great story on its own merit but a positive depiction of live in Modern day America and then in Modern day Jerusalem.
D. Praise from School Library Journal:
From School Library Journal
Grade 5-9. An important first novel from a distinguished anthologist and poet. When Liyana's doctor father, a native Palestinian, decides to move his contemporary Arab-American family back to Jerusalem from St. Louis, 14-year-old Liyana is unenthusiastic. Arriving in Jerusalem, the girl and her family are gathered in by their colorful, warmhearted Palestinian relatives and immersed in a culture where only tourists wear shorts and there is a prohibition against boy/girl relationships. When Liyana falls in love with Omer, a Jewish boy, she challenges family, culture, and tradition, but her homesickness fades. Constantly lurking in the background of the novel is violence between Palestinian and Jew. It builds from minor bureaucratic annoyances and humiliations, to the surprisingly shocking destruction of grandmother's bathroom by Israeli soldiers, to a bomb set off in a Jewish marketplace by Palestinians. It exacts a reprisal in which Liyana's friend is shot and her father jailed. Nye introduces readers to unforgettable characters. The setting is both sensory and tangible: from the grandmother's village to a Bedouin camp. Above all, there is Jerusalem itself, where ancient tensions seep out of cracks and Liyana explores the streets practicing her Arabic vocabulary. Though the story begins at a leisurely pace, readers will be engaged by the characters, the romance, and the foreshadowed danger. Poetically imaged and leavened with humor, the story renders layered and complex history understandable through character and incident. Habibi succeeds in making the hope for peace compellingly personal and concrete...as long as individual citizens like Liyana's grandmother Sitti can say, "I never lost my peace inside."?Kate McClelland, Perrot Memorial Library, Greenwich, CT
Mentioned in the New York Times Book Review:
The New York Times Book Review, Karen Leggett
Adolescence magnifies the joys and anxieties of growing up even as it radically simplifies the complexities of the adult world. The poet and anthologist Naomi Shibab Nye is meticulously sensitive to this rainbow of emotion in her autobiographical novel, Habibi…. Habibi gives a reader all the sweet richness of a Mediterranean dessert, while leaving some of the historic complexities open to interpretation. (Ages 10 and older
Reviews accessed at: http://www.amazon.com/Habibi-Naomi-Shihab-Nye/dp/0689825234/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/103-7575722-4136600?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1186287566&sr=1-1
E. Connections:
Nye has written another wonderful book entitled; SITTI’S SECRET. It is for children a bit younger. Nye has also published a volume of poetry, THE FLAG OF CHILDHOOD
LS 5903 MULTICULTURAL LITERATURE
Review of MOSES GOES TO A CONCERT
A. Millman, Isaac. MOSES GOES TO A CONCERT. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux for Frances Foster Books, 1998. (Millman is the illustrator as well as the author.)
B. PLOT SUMMARY
Moses is a deaf student and he goes to a concert with kids from his school who are also deaf. Moses plays the drums at home and he can’t hear them like a child with good hearing but he feels the vibrations in his hand as he plays. At the symphony the lead percussionist is deaf. The children did not know ahead of time that the star of the show was deaf and that she would perform in her sock feet because that’s how she picked up the vibrations of the melody and harmony. The class uses sign language during the performance just as others might whisper before the show starts. Their teacher, Mr. Samuels is a dedicated one and he wants to maximize each child’s potential for learning, for fun, and the ability to participate by blowing up a balloon for each student. They can feel the vibrations of the concert in their balloons. After the show they get to ask the percussionist, Ms. Elywn about music. Elywn lets the kids take turns banging on her snare drums, bass drums, xylophone, etc. The whole ordeal turns out to be a marvelous day for everyone.
C. CRITICAL ANALYSIS (WITH CULTURAL MARKERS)
I just first have to start with the fact that I think this is a rare and exceptional picturebook. The pictures are vivid and appropriately bright without overdoing it. The pictures Moses’ room full of toys that are just a little bit messy, of the yellow school bus, the bus drivers expression, the children skipping and holding hands are so on the money. The expressions of the teacher as he turns his head to count the students on the bus and model good behaviors are done extremely well, very true to life.
This book would be very well received by almost any child Pre-school through at least grade 2. I think this would be an exceptional cream of the crop book for “Children with disabilities” week, etc. It would be so extremely effective because for the most part it’s just a bright, exciting picture book that anyone can enjoy. I think that is it’s biggest strength.
Now considering that the book is full of American Sign Language could be a pleasant aside or it could be the primary reason for selecting the book. The introduction to the book gives information on ASL: American Sign Language. There is a rather straightforward chart at the beginning of the book that teaches “How to Read the Arrows and Symbols” used in the book. Each double spread page has Moses signing a sentence at the bottom of the page on the right. The arrows help to show words and sentences that would contain more than one static symbol so children could easily practice some simple 1st grade level words. The back page is so very beautiful. It’s entitled “The Hand Alphabet” and shows a clear picture of the sign. On the :hand alphabet” page Millman has drawn subdued and very detailed pictures of each letter to show how more often that not the hand signal letters resemble the letter they are portraying.
The book does a really special thing by making “special education” children look just like regular children. These kids get excited, some of them wave at the percussionist rather than clapping. The students on the bus with Moses are black, white, dark, fair, wear braids, pigtails. There is a character or two that may be Asian Pacific Americans but it is hard to be certain. Nonetheless, the children are close to reality of what a class of deaf children would normally be, pretty much equal numbers of boys and girls, and many ethnicities represented. A small but powerful thing that creeps in at the very end of the story when Ms. Elywn is talking about her job is that the children could begin to see that they will be able to go into most any career field they are interested in, despite their handicap. People, including many teachers say we spend way too much time dealing with “self esteem” but for kids that don’t have much a little goes a long way of allowing them to think of themselves in different positive roles at work, of encouraging them and reminding them that they have unlimited potential. The part of the book that says it all, that sums up the beauty and message of the story is when Moses shares with his parents about the concert: “When you set your mind to it you can become anything you want when you grow up…….a Dr,. Artist, Teacher, Lawyer, Farmer, Electrician or Actor. I want to become a Percussionist.” The other thing that is so noteworthy is that the percussionist is in love with life. From her hot pink and black tuxedo top, traditionally colored black pants and hot pink socks, Ms. Elywn is special. She rocks, rolls, dances, and her sense of play is catching and uplifting to the children. I like the “something about the author” portion on the back jacket where it tells us of Mr. Millman’s ethnicity……..born in France to Jewish immigrants for Poland before becoming U.S. citizens. Millman also mentions his military career, his family, and his degree from the prestigious Pratt Institute.
There is just no stereotyping, no labeling, making children’s faces look less than intelligent, or like a Down Syndrome Child. Sign language makes this kids powerful and their potential limitless. Having a teacher like Mr. Samuels would be most special indeed. The field trip was very special to each child but for Moses who already loved to play the drums at his house at such an early age this positive meeting with another percussionist is the kind of story that middle aged men and women talk about “changes their lives.” Bravo to Tillman. I already want to read it again.
On the first page Max has a dog, a Dalmatian. He is not on a leash but something that looks a bit like an old cloth jump rope has them together in a circle within it’s arms. Little things are important in this story too. You can’t quite tell if the buses are ‘short buses” (which children automatically associate with Special Ed.) or regular size buses. I just can’t find a thing I would ask Millman to improve. I’ve got to see if this guy has written any other books!
So a wonderful story with lovely pictures that ALSO JUST HAPPENS TO BE ABOUT DISABILITIES. Hurray!
Ah, ha. I’ve just found out this is a series of books………..Moses goes to school, Moses sees a play, etc.
D. REVIEW EXCERPTS:
Well, I guess here we go with the disagreements about “insider knowledge” and authenticity.
An amazon customer review:
Since this book was not written by a hard of hearing person, it does not give an appropriate view of the hard of hearing world. This book could not apply to deaf people becasue deaf people cannot hear music -- only feel the vibrations. The book gives a clear view of how hearing people view the heard of hearing world. It is a beginning, but it is not the best book.
School Library Journal comments,
“Cheerful watercolor illustrations show the multiethnic children enjoying themselves at the concert, while smaller cartoon strips feature Moses's additional comments in sign language. A page displaying the manual alphabet and a conversation in sign language in which Moses tells his parents about his day enhance the upbeat story.?Sally R. Dow, Ossining Public Library, NY
Cheers from Publisher’s Weekly:
“The seemingly incongruous premise of this harmonious debut a class of deaf children attends an orchestral concert leads to a revelation for readers who may well have assumed that the ability to hear is a prerequisite for enjoying music. Holding balloons that their teacher passes out to help them "feel the music," Moses and his classmates are thrilled to pick up the vibrations. Afterward, they visit with the orchestra's deaf percussionist, who, intriguingly, performs in stocking feet so she, too, can feel the beat. She lets the students play her instruments and, using American Sign Language (precisely illustrated in easy-to-read diagrams), explains how she worked hard to achieve her career goal…..An introductory note explains how to interpret the sign-language diagrams, which are integrated throughout the clear and colorful illustrations. Fiction and instruction make beautiful music together on these cheerful pages.” Ages 5-up.
Reviews accessed from:
http://www.amazon.com/Moses-Goes-Concert/dp/0374453667/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/103-7575722-4136600?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1186282720&sr=1-1
D. CONNECTIONS:
The above other books in the series would be my first choice. Besides the titles mentioned above there is also MOSES GOES TO THE CIRCUS.
I really don’t know another “Special Ed.” book, certainly not another book about deaf children that can hold a candle to Millman’s work.
A. Millman, Isaac. MOSES GOES TO A CONCERT. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux for Frances Foster Books, 1998. (Millman is the illustrator as well as the author.)
B. PLOT SUMMARY
Moses is a deaf student and he goes to a concert with kids from his school who are also deaf. Moses plays the drums at home and he can’t hear them like a child with good hearing but he feels the vibrations in his hand as he plays. At the symphony the lead percussionist is deaf. The children did not know ahead of time that the star of the show was deaf and that she would perform in her sock feet because that’s how she picked up the vibrations of the melody and harmony. The class uses sign language during the performance just as others might whisper before the show starts. Their teacher, Mr. Samuels is a dedicated one and he wants to maximize each child’s potential for learning, for fun, and the ability to participate by blowing up a balloon for each student. They can feel the vibrations of the concert in their balloons. After the show they get to ask the percussionist, Ms. Elywn about music. Elywn lets the kids take turns banging on her snare drums, bass drums, xylophone, etc. The whole ordeal turns out to be a marvelous day for everyone.
C. CRITICAL ANALYSIS (WITH CULTURAL MARKERS)
I just first have to start with the fact that I think this is a rare and exceptional picturebook. The pictures are vivid and appropriately bright without overdoing it. The pictures Moses’ room full of toys that are just a little bit messy, of the yellow school bus, the bus drivers expression, the children skipping and holding hands are so on the money. The expressions of the teacher as he turns his head to count the students on the bus and model good behaviors are done extremely well, very true to life.
This book would be very well received by almost any child Pre-school through at least grade 2. I think this would be an exceptional cream of the crop book for “Children with disabilities” week, etc. It would be so extremely effective because for the most part it’s just a bright, exciting picture book that anyone can enjoy. I think that is it’s biggest strength.
Now considering that the book is full of American Sign Language could be a pleasant aside or it could be the primary reason for selecting the book. The introduction to the book gives information on ASL: American Sign Language. There is a rather straightforward chart at the beginning of the book that teaches “How to Read the Arrows and Symbols” used in the book. Each double spread page has Moses signing a sentence at the bottom of the page on the right. The arrows help to show words and sentences that would contain more than one static symbol so children could easily practice some simple 1st grade level words. The back page is so very beautiful. It’s entitled “The Hand Alphabet” and shows a clear picture of the sign. On the :hand alphabet” page Millman has drawn subdued and very detailed pictures of each letter to show how more often that not the hand signal letters resemble the letter they are portraying.
The book does a really special thing by making “special education” children look just like regular children. These kids get excited, some of them wave at the percussionist rather than clapping. The students on the bus with Moses are black, white, dark, fair, wear braids, pigtails. There is a character or two that may be Asian Pacific Americans but it is hard to be certain. Nonetheless, the children are close to reality of what a class of deaf children would normally be, pretty much equal numbers of boys and girls, and many ethnicities represented. A small but powerful thing that creeps in at the very end of the story when Ms. Elywn is talking about her job is that the children could begin to see that they will be able to go into most any career field they are interested in, despite their handicap. People, including many teachers say we spend way too much time dealing with “self esteem” but for kids that don’t have much a little goes a long way of allowing them to think of themselves in different positive roles at work, of encouraging them and reminding them that they have unlimited potential. The part of the book that says it all, that sums up the beauty and message of the story is when Moses shares with his parents about the concert: “When you set your mind to it you can become anything you want when you grow up…….a Dr,. Artist, Teacher, Lawyer, Farmer, Electrician or Actor. I want to become a Percussionist.” The other thing that is so noteworthy is that the percussionist is in love with life. From her hot pink and black tuxedo top, traditionally colored black pants and hot pink socks, Ms. Elywn is special. She rocks, rolls, dances, and her sense of play is catching and uplifting to the children. I like the “something about the author” portion on the back jacket where it tells us of Mr. Millman’s ethnicity……..born in France to Jewish immigrants for Poland before becoming U.S. citizens. Millman also mentions his military career, his family, and his degree from the prestigious Pratt Institute.
There is just no stereotyping, no labeling, making children’s faces look less than intelligent, or like a Down Syndrome Child. Sign language makes this kids powerful and their potential limitless. Having a teacher like Mr. Samuels would be most special indeed. The field trip was very special to each child but for Moses who already loved to play the drums at his house at such an early age this positive meeting with another percussionist is the kind of story that middle aged men and women talk about “changes their lives.” Bravo to Tillman. I already want to read it again.
On the first page Max has a dog, a Dalmatian. He is not on a leash but something that looks a bit like an old cloth jump rope has them together in a circle within it’s arms. Little things are important in this story too. You can’t quite tell if the buses are ‘short buses” (which children automatically associate with Special Ed.) or regular size buses. I just can’t find a thing I would ask Millman to improve. I’ve got to see if this guy has written any other books!
So a wonderful story with lovely pictures that ALSO JUST HAPPENS TO BE ABOUT DISABILITIES. Hurray!
Ah, ha. I’ve just found out this is a series of books………..Moses goes to school, Moses sees a play, etc.
D. REVIEW EXCERPTS:
Well, I guess here we go with the disagreements about “insider knowledge” and authenticity.
An amazon customer review:
Since this book was not written by a hard of hearing person, it does not give an appropriate view of the hard of hearing world. This book could not apply to deaf people becasue deaf people cannot hear music -- only feel the vibrations. The book gives a clear view of how hearing people view the heard of hearing world. It is a beginning, but it is not the best book.
School Library Journal comments,
“Cheerful watercolor illustrations show the multiethnic children enjoying themselves at the concert, while smaller cartoon strips feature Moses's additional comments in sign language. A page displaying the manual alphabet and a conversation in sign language in which Moses tells his parents about his day enhance the upbeat story.?Sally R. Dow, Ossining Public Library, NY
Cheers from Publisher’s Weekly:
“The seemingly incongruous premise of this harmonious debut a class of deaf children attends an orchestral concert leads to a revelation for readers who may well have assumed that the ability to hear is a prerequisite for enjoying music. Holding balloons that their teacher passes out to help them "feel the music," Moses and his classmates are thrilled to pick up the vibrations. Afterward, they visit with the orchestra's deaf percussionist, who, intriguingly, performs in stocking feet so she, too, can feel the beat. She lets the students play her instruments and, using American Sign Language (precisely illustrated in easy-to-read diagrams), explains how she worked hard to achieve her career goal…..An introductory note explains how to interpret the sign-language diagrams, which are integrated throughout the clear and colorful illustrations. Fiction and instruction make beautiful music together on these cheerful pages.” Ages 5-up.
Reviews accessed from:
http://www.amazon.com/Moses-Goes-Concert/dp/0374453667/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/103-7575722-4136600?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1186282720&sr=1-1
D. CONNECTIONS:
The above other books in the series would be my first choice. Besides the titles mentioned above there is also MOSES GOES TO THE CIRCUS.
I really don’t know another “Special Ed.” book, certainly not another book about deaf children that can hold a candle to Millman’s work.
Thursday, July 26, 2007
LS 5903 MULTICULTURAL LITERATURE
A. Say, Allen. (written and illustrated by Mr. Say) ALLISON. Boston: Houghton
Mifflin, 1997
B. PLOT SUMMARY:
Allison is a beautiful little girl about 4 years old. She was adopted as a baby girl from either China or Japan, the book is vague about Allison’s homeland. Adoptive Mom looks to be 35-45 and Dad 40-50 years of age. They love Allison very much and have given her a happy middle class life but have never broached the subject of adoption with their daughter. Trouble starts when Allison’s Grandmother sends her a beautiful red and white silk kimono. When Allison’s adoptive parents see her for the first time she has a doll with her. The doll looks like an exquisite minature Geisha with her unnaturally white, white face and rich multicolored silk garments. Allison has always considered her doll to be her real sister. The doll is a constant companion of Allison and the doll is named “Mei Mei” which is the Chinese word for “little sister” or “baby sister.” Allison has the doll even before her new parents make it over for her adoption in early infancy. The unhappiness begins when Allison is looking in the mirror at herself in the kimono. She is holding Mei Mei and when she sees how much she looks like Mei Mei and that she doesn’t favor her parents she becomes upset and withdrawn both at home and at preschool. Her parents tell her how much they love her and that they went to get her when she was a little baby. During lunch Allison is very quite and Allison begins to ask the hard questions. First was where did Mei Mei come from and her Father answers, “Far, far away, from another country.” Daddy is being honest and Allison is getting more and more insecure and upset. Dad then continues, “Mommy and I went there and brought you and Mei Mei home with us.” Then Allison wants to know about her real parents and why they would leave her, why they didn’t want her. She asks about her birth parents. She wants to at least see their picture but her current parents don’t have one. Allison tells her parents that they aren’t her Mommy and Daddy and asks poignantly, “They didn’t want me?” The dialog is realistically painful. The next day at preschool Allison asks her classmate Eric, “Are your daddy’s eyes like your eyes? They’re blue, he said. Do you have a mommy in another country: No, she’s home, replies Eric.” Allison continues “I mean another mommy who gave you away?” Allison comes home angry, hurt, and most upset. She cuts the hair of her Mom’s childhood doll and attacks her Dad’s childhood ball and glove. An adult cat keeps appearing and Allison becomes attached to her and her parents let her adopt the cat and then the story ends happily ever after. A modern fairy tale that is not true to life.
C. CRITICAL ANALYSIS (With Cultural Markers)
Say has outdone himself with the beautiful paintings of Allison and her little doll Mei Mei. The facial expressions and emotions of the characters in the story are very tight and true to life. Hair and eye colors of Allison’s presumably European American parents and Allison herself seem appropriate and authentic.
The problem here is a story that certainly could have happened, but if it had the positive ending would never have come so easily and quickly with all loose ends tied up and hurt erased.
There is still a big debate about whether children of one ethnicity should be allowed to be adopted by parents of another racial background. I don’t think it is an ideal situation but for once I agree with Bill O’Reilly’s about something. His position that there are not enough loving parents to adopt so many children who are ripe for adoption. O’Reilly says gay and lesbian couples, interracial couples and any loving person willing to sacrifice enough to be a good parent should be given the opportunity. He sees that as preferable to a string of foster homes where there is often abuse and motivation can be economic. People are becoming more accepting as a whole I would venture to guess of international and interracial adoption as people like Angelina Jolie, Madonna, and even Senator John McCain have gotten involved in this for both personal and humanitarian reasons.
The story is believable in that a 4 or 5 year old could figure this out and talk to peers and parents about the issue but the story ends too neatly. Allison wants to adopt the kitty and her parents let her. She tells her doll Mei Mei that she will never give her away. All of a sudden from her bedroom Allison screams out, to her parents, Allison is not my real name, what is my real name?
Say is too bright and influential to have made a careless mistake of giving a doll a Chinese name and dressing the doll and Allison in Japanese kimonos. There is some hidden meaning that is not apparent to laypeople or professional reviewers alike.
Finding your place as an Asian Pacific American is an authentic and popular theme so that is in the plus column for the story. Costume is mentioned and displayed but no talk of customs, traditions, geography ever comes up. Wouldn’t most parents have brought a bit of Allison’s culture into her life before now? When having tea parties letting her know how important tea was in her home country would have been a small help. I would hope that considerate and educated parents as Allison’s appear to be in the story would have been reading folktales for Allison’s home country and close environs, that they would have taught her origami or to eat grocery store suishi, at least something.
I find the book to be an enigma. The message is mixed and the quick resolution makes this not very good literature in my eye. Cats are nice but did this cat belong to a neighbor? Why didn’t any one think of that before they promised Allison she could keep this kitty artfully depicted as well fed, actually a bit overweight. Doesn’t everyone know by now that milk is not good for cats. More than a tiny bit gives them an upset stomach. Why didn’t someone offer the cat tuna or something more appropriate? That is the problem with the book overall that too much suspension of belief is necessary. Heartbreak and confusion about adoption, especially with a preschooler can not be “fixed” in 24 to 48 hours as in the book. Did Allison grow to like her name? Why would she accept it without question in the end after she gets upset about it earlier in the story. This would not be a good first, second, or third book about adoption for most children. The biggest harm to a child I think is in the fact that as quickly as Allison gets mad and upset she gets over it. Any child in this situation will deal with fear, wondering why their parents lied to them and this book might give them the message that their anger and emotional upset are not legitimate and that could certainly cause much unnecessary guilt for a child who is simply going through a normal range of emotions. I’m not sure if I would recommend it to an Oriental child being brought up by a Caucasian family or not. The book is full of half of each story and half truths. It is just way too unrealistic for my tastes. Certainly it is a fairy tale that “white” Americans who have adopted children from Asian Pacific homelands wish were true!
D. REVIEW EXCERPTS:
School Library Journal says,
“The conclusion is abrupt and somewhat contrived. One can't help wondering, too, why Allison don't already know about her past if she is surrounded by cultural reminders and why her parents don't respond to her pain with immediate physical and verbal warmth and comfort. The compelling artwork will surely attract attention.. However, for first choices that combine honesty with reassurance, try Karen Katz's Over the Moon: An Adoption Tale (Holt, 1997) or Fred Rogers's Lets Talk About It: Adoption (Putnam, 1995).?Wendy Lukehart, Dauphin County Library, Harrisburg,
Kirkus review states, “A stray cat who has been hanging around their house provides Allison with another--albeit unstated--view of adoption and she cheers up enough to rejoin her family. Say masterfully captures Allison's expressions: She is surprised, wounded, sullen, hurt and hurtful, and finally reassured. He addresses the dark side of an adoptive child's feelings carefully, and while the resolution is a bit convenient (and may require interpretation for younger children), it still carries truth.”
REVIEWS ACCESSED AT :
http://www.amazon.com/Allison-Allen-Say/dp/0618495371/ref=dp_return_1/103-7575722-4136600?ie=UTF8&n=283155&s=books&qid=1185504751&sr=1-1
E. CONNECTIONS:
Ed Young’s MY MEI MEI is the story of adopting a young child from China. It is also in picturebook format. It would be a delicate decision about which book to follow or use in place of ALLISON if you were a teacher or parent in a similar circumstance. There are several Reference books on Bibliotherapy. That is the volume I would reach for next. In a perfect world one would reach for that volume first.
Mifflin, 1997
B. PLOT SUMMARY:
Allison is a beautiful little girl about 4 years old. She was adopted as a baby girl from either China or Japan, the book is vague about Allison’s homeland. Adoptive Mom looks to be 35-45 and Dad 40-50 years of age. They love Allison very much and have given her a happy middle class life but have never broached the subject of adoption with their daughter. Trouble starts when Allison’s Grandmother sends her a beautiful red and white silk kimono. When Allison’s adoptive parents see her for the first time she has a doll with her. The doll looks like an exquisite minature Geisha with her unnaturally white, white face and rich multicolored silk garments. Allison has always considered her doll to be her real sister. The doll is a constant companion of Allison and the doll is named “Mei Mei” which is the Chinese word for “little sister” or “baby sister.” Allison has the doll even before her new parents make it over for her adoption in early infancy. The unhappiness begins when Allison is looking in the mirror at herself in the kimono. She is holding Mei Mei and when she sees how much she looks like Mei Mei and that she doesn’t favor her parents she becomes upset and withdrawn both at home and at preschool. Her parents tell her how much they love her and that they went to get her when she was a little baby. During lunch Allison is very quite and Allison begins to ask the hard questions. First was where did Mei Mei come from and her Father answers, “Far, far away, from another country.” Daddy is being honest and Allison is getting more and more insecure and upset. Dad then continues, “Mommy and I went there and brought you and Mei Mei home with us.” Then Allison wants to know about her real parents and why they would leave her, why they didn’t want her. She asks about her birth parents. She wants to at least see their picture but her current parents don’t have one. Allison tells her parents that they aren’t her Mommy and Daddy and asks poignantly, “They didn’t want me?” The dialog is realistically painful. The next day at preschool Allison asks her classmate Eric, “Are your daddy’s eyes like your eyes? They’re blue, he said. Do you have a mommy in another country: No, she’s home, replies Eric.” Allison continues “I mean another mommy who gave you away?” Allison comes home angry, hurt, and most upset. She cuts the hair of her Mom’s childhood doll and attacks her Dad’s childhood ball and glove. An adult cat keeps appearing and Allison becomes attached to her and her parents let her adopt the cat and then the story ends happily ever after. A modern fairy tale that is not true to life.
C. CRITICAL ANALYSIS (With Cultural Markers)
Say has outdone himself with the beautiful paintings of Allison and her little doll Mei Mei. The facial expressions and emotions of the characters in the story are very tight and true to life. Hair and eye colors of Allison’s presumably European American parents and Allison herself seem appropriate and authentic.
The problem here is a story that certainly could have happened, but if it had the positive ending would never have come so easily and quickly with all loose ends tied up and hurt erased.
There is still a big debate about whether children of one ethnicity should be allowed to be adopted by parents of another racial background. I don’t think it is an ideal situation but for once I agree with Bill O’Reilly’s about something. His position that there are not enough loving parents to adopt so many children who are ripe for adoption. O’Reilly says gay and lesbian couples, interracial couples and any loving person willing to sacrifice enough to be a good parent should be given the opportunity. He sees that as preferable to a string of foster homes where there is often abuse and motivation can be economic. People are becoming more accepting as a whole I would venture to guess of international and interracial adoption as people like Angelina Jolie, Madonna, and even Senator John McCain have gotten involved in this for both personal and humanitarian reasons.
The story is believable in that a 4 or 5 year old could figure this out and talk to peers and parents about the issue but the story ends too neatly. Allison wants to adopt the kitty and her parents let her. She tells her doll Mei Mei that she will never give her away. All of a sudden from her bedroom Allison screams out, to her parents, Allison is not my real name, what is my real name?
Say is too bright and influential to have made a careless mistake of giving a doll a Chinese name and dressing the doll and Allison in Japanese kimonos. There is some hidden meaning that is not apparent to laypeople or professional reviewers alike.
Finding your place as an Asian Pacific American is an authentic and popular theme so that is in the plus column for the story. Costume is mentioned and displayed but no talk of customs, traditions, geography ever comes up. Wouldn’t most parents have brought a bit of Allison’s culture into her life before now? When having tea parties letting her know how important tea was in her home country would have been a small help. I would hope that considerate and educated parents as Allison’s appear to be in the story would have been reading folktales for Allison’s home country and close environs, that they would have taught her origami or to eat grocery store suishi, at least something.
I find the book to be an enigma. The message is mixed and the quick resolution makes this not very good literature in my eye. Cats are nice but did this cat belong to a neighbor? Why didn’t any one think of that before they promised Allison she could keep this kitty artfully depicted as well fed, actually a bit overweight. Doesn’t everyone know by now that milk is not good for cats. More than a tiny bit gives them an upset stomach. Why didn’t someone offer the cat tuna or something more appropriate? That is the problem with the book overall that too much suspension of belief is necessary. Heartbreak and confusion about adoption, especially with a preschooler can not be “fixed” in 24 to 48 hours as in the book. Did Allison grow to like her name? Why would she accept it without question in the end after she gets upset about it earlier in the story. This would not be a good first, second, or third book about adoption for most children. The biggest harm to a child I think is in the fact that as quickly as Allison gets mad and upset she gets over it. Any child in this situation will deal with fear, wondering why their parents lied to them and this book might give them the message that their anger and emotional upset are not legitimate and that could certainly cause much unnecessary guilt for a child who is simply going through a normal range of emotions. I’m not sure if I would recommend it to an Oriental child being brought up by a Caucasian family or not. The book is full of half of each story and half truths. It is just way too unrealistic for my tastes. Certainly it is a fairy tale that “white” Americans who have adopted children from Asian Pacific homelands wish were true!
D. REVIEW EXCERPTS:
School Library Journal says,
“The conclusion is abrupt and somewhat contrived. One can't help wondering, too, why Allison don't already know about her past if she is surrounded by cultural reminders and why her parents don't respond to her pain with immediate physical and verbal warmth and comfort. The compelling artwork will surely attract attention.. However, for first choices that combine honesty with reassurance, try Karen Katz's Over the Moon: An Adoption Tale (Holt, 1997) or Fred Rogers's Lets Talk About It: Adoption (Putnam, 1995).?Wendy Lukehart, Dauphin County Library, Harrisburg,
Kirkus review states, “A stray cat who has been hanging around their house provides Allison with another--albeit unstated--view of adoption and she cheers up enough to rejoin her family. Say masterfully captures Allison's expressions: She is surprised, wounded, sullen, hurt and hurtful, and finally reassured. He addresses the dark side of an adoptive child's feelings carefully, and while the resolution is a bit convenient (and may require interpretation for younger children), it still carries truth.”
REVIEWS ACCESSED AT :
http://www.amazon.com/Allison-Allen-Say/dp/0618495371/ref=dp_return_1/103-7575722-4136600?ie=UTF8&n=283155&s=books&qid=1185504751&sr=1-1
E. CONNECTIONS:
Ed Young’s MY MEI MEI is the story of adopting a young child from China. It is also in picturebook format. It would be a delicate decision about which book to follow or use in place of ALLISON if you were a teacher or parent in a similar circumstance. There are several Reference books on Bibliotherapy. That is the volume I would reach for next. In a perfect world one would reach for that volume first.
LS 5903 MULTICULTURAL LITERATURE
A. Wong, Janet S. THIS NEXT NEW YEAR. New York: Frances Foster Books for Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2000. Illustrated by Yangsook Choi.
B. PLOT SUMMARY
Our narrator is a young boy with a Chinese Father and a Korean Mother. He gives a quick description of the “regular” New Year and then tells us how he and his friends and neighbors celebrate Chinese New Year in many different ways depending on their various ethnic identities. He speaks of cleaning the house by saying, “We are scrubbing our house rough and raw so it can soak up good luck like an empty sponge.” The young boy and his family seem just barely to cross the line into middle class status and our narrator actively wishes for more money, new clothes, and good luck to finally come to rest at his home. Wong sums up that feeling of being joyous even though you may come from humble origins in the last lines of her end notes. “We never got rich. But we always had plenty to share.”
C. CRITICAL ANALYSIS (INCLUDING CULTURAL MARKERS)
I liked the book very much for its positive message. It is a message not stated but implied, that every ethnic group is special in its own unique way, not just the unique way they are portrayed celebrating Chinese New Year. Our young boy narraator tells the way his family celebrates “the regular new year, January 1, when we watch the Rose Parade and football games and make crazy New Year’s resolutions.” There is an attempt, and for me a very successful one of inclusion. A purist or orthodox minded individual may disagree but showing how immigrants from China, Korea, France, Germany, a Native American from the Hopi tribe, a Mexican, and a lady from Singapore all celebrate Chinese New Year seems to acknowledge that Chinese New Year is indeed a special holiday and that it is perfectly fine for different families from parts of the world to acknowledge it in their own way.
The other major point about ethnicities brought up in the book is how most all of us in America have a mixed heritage. Our young protagonist tells of celebrating Chinese New Year “even though I am half Korean.” While most of their meal and the other ways they celebrate the holiday are traditionally Chinese, our main character makes a point of telling us that his Mom, whose ancestry is Korean rather than Chinese makes duk gook, the Korean new years soup to add to their otherwise Chinese holiday supper. The little boy speaks of his best friend, “who is French and German.” He states that Glenn’s family calls the holiday Chinese New Year too, but their way of celebrating and acknowledging the season is to eat take out food from a Thai restaurant. The little boy’s other best friend is called Evelyn and she “is part Hopi and part Mexican.” Evelyn claims this as her favorite holiday. Our narrator thinks Evelyn likes Chinese New Year best because the kids have an older neighbor whose roots are in Singapore and she distributes “red envelopes with money stuffed” inside to the neighborhood children.
Counting our little boy narrator there are four other characters and families. Three of the four have a well known mixed heritage. The narrator; Chinese and Korean. The “white” family with French and German roots, the little girl that is Hopi and Mexican. The woman from Singapore is the only person in the story without a mixed heritage. This was the idea of the American Dream when I was a little girl—the rich colored and textured melting pot where assimilation and blended traditions was a goal. Sometimes ethnic groups want to revel in each other’s differences. Wong is pleased to see how much all groups are alike, how it may be just as important to stake your claim as an American than to simply exist as a foreigner in your own enclave of people with the same heritage that is not open to change or an immigrant who wants to recreate his space from his home country to make a “Little Italy” or a “Chinatown.”
The theme of trying to find your place as an Asian Pacific American is very much a part of this story. The book also does a fine job in explaining the traditional customs of Chinese New Year. The neighborhood in the story might well be called “transitional” by a realtor these days to mean that people from many different backgrounds live there in what appears to be at least in part due to financial reasons. I happen to live in a neighborhood like this with extravagant homes very close by but my great subdivision is considered tainted because we cross over one block over the “line” which is Buford Highway.
The art work by Choi is done appropriately. The European family has lighter skin tone than the people of color that populate most of the book. The artwork of the Chinese Dragon parade is vivid, realistic, and appealing. For the holiday meal our little fellow is pictured seated in a cross legged fashion on a pillow in his sockfeet at a low table. Their table and wall decorations are obviously from the Asian tradition. I do not know enough to differentiate between Chinese and Korean artwork and tablecloths. The most beautiful illustrations in the book are the full page spreads in bright yellow and green with a bit of orange that picture our young friend in the bathtub with bubbles of all sizes filling up the pages as the rubber ducky looks on and the pup tries to pop a bubble that has floated into the air. On the following page as doggy sits on the toilet seat trying to figure out what in the world his little master is doing by flossing his teeth. The last page of the book features our little man and his dog flying in the air. The boy looks very reminiscent of the young girl protagonist in Faith Ringold’s TAR BEACH in this picture and he too dreams of a better life “somewhere out there.”
THIS NEXT NEW YEAR is a bright warm book portraying the author’s ideas about how immigrants, especially Asian Pacific Americans, can become a piece of the American Pie without loosing their cultural ingredients.
D. REVIEW EXCERPTS:
Amazon.com editorializes: "Yangsook Choi's artfully composed, action-packed paintings add uplifting color to the happy spirit of the holiday, and an author's note provides more details about the Chinese New Year and Wong's childhood memories of the celebration. This delightful picture book makes a fine addition to the small collection of Chinese New Year books, distinguishing itself with the narrator's endearingly persistent quest for luck: "They say you are coming into money / when your palms itch, / and my palms have been itching for days. / My brother thinks it's warts, / but I know luck is coming." (Ages 4 to 8) --Emilie Coulter
School Library Journal opines, " The narrator's mother cooks a special Korean soup, and his family observes the traditions of house cleaning, lighting firecrackers, and being extra good to ensure a lucky new year. Wong carefully and clearly presents the reasons behind the rituals in a manner understandable to young children. She explains in an appended note about her own confusion as a child about the timing and meaning of the holiday. Choi's vibrant, somewhat primitive paintings realistically capture the details of and preparations for this hopeful time of year. Youngsters will enjoy the bright colors and the sense of motion and activity conveyed as the boy helps his mother clean, flosses his teeth, and cringes from the noise of the firecrackers. A good choice for anyone getting ready to celebrate Chinese New Year.
Anne Connor, Los Angeles Public Library
Reviews accessed from:
http://www.amazon.com/This-Next-Year-Janet-Wong/dp/0374355037/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-2255834-9114420?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1185497936&sr=1-1
E. CONNECTIONS
SAM AND THE LUCKY MONEY is another wonderful picturebook about Chinese New Year written with an insider's perspective by Karen Chinn.
``
B. PLOT SUMMARY
Our narrator is a young boy with a Chinese Father and a Korean Mother. He gives a quick description of the “regular” New Year and then tells us how he and his friends and neighbors celebrate Chinese New Year in many different ways depending on their various ethnic identities. He speaks of cleaning the house by saying, “We are scrubbing our house rough and raw so it can soak up good luck like an empty sponge.” The young boy and his family seem just barely to cross the line into middle class status and our narrator actively wishes for more money, new clothes, and good luck to finally come to rest at his home. Wong sums up that feeling of being joyous even though you may come from humble origins in the last lines of her end notes. “We never got rich. But we always had plenty to share.”
C. CRITICAL ANALYSIS (INCLUDING CULTURAL MARKERS)
I liked the book very much for its positive message. It is a message not stated but implied, that every ethnic group is special in its own unique way, not just the unique way they are portrayed celebrating Chinese New Year. Our young boy narraator tells the way his family celebrates “the regular new year, January 1, when we watch the Rose Parade and football games and make crazy New Year’s resolutions.” There is an attempt, and for me a very successful one of inclusion. A purist or orthodox minded individual may disagree but showing how immigrants from China, Korea, France, Germany, a Native American from the Hopi tribe, a Mexican, and a lady from Singapore all celebrate Chinese New Year seems to acknowledge that Chinese New Year is indeed a special holiday and that it is perfectly fine for different families from parts of the world to acknowledge it in their own way.
The other major point about ethnicities brought up in the book is how most all of us in America have a mixed heritage. Our young protagonist tells of celebrating Chinese New Year “even though I am half Korean.” While most of their meal and the other ways they celebrate the holiday are traditionally Chinese, our main character makes a point of telling us that his Mom, whose ancestry is Korean rather than Chinese makes duk gook, the Korean new years soup to add to their otherwise Chinese holiday supper. The little boy speaks of his best friend, “who is French and German.” He states that Glenn’s family calls the holiday Chinese New Year too, but their way of celebrating and acknowledging the season is to eat take out food from a Thai restaurant. The little boy’s other best friend is called Evelyn and she “is part Hopi and part Mexican.” Evelyn claims this as her favorite holiday. Our narrator thinks Evelyn likes Chinese New Year best because the kids have an older neighbor whose roots are in Singapore and she distributes “red envelopes with money stuffed” inside to the neighborhood children.
Counting our little boy narrator there are four other characters and families. Three of the four have a well known mixed heritage. The narrator; Chinese and Korean. The “white” family with French and German roots, the little girl that is Hopi and Mexican. The woman from Singapore is the only person in the story without a mixed heritage. This was the idea of the American Dream when I was a little girl—the rich colored and textured melting pot where assimilation and blended traditions was a goal. Sometimes ethnic groups want to revel in each other’s differences. Wong is pleased to see how much all groups are alike, how it may be just as important to stake your claim as an American than to simply exist as a foreigner in your own enclave of people with the same heritage that is not open to change or an immigrant who wants to recreate his space from his home country to make a “Little Italy” or a “Chinatown.”
The theme of trying to find your place as an Asian Pacific American is very much a part of this story. The book also does a fine job in explaining the traditional customs of Chinese New Year. The neighborhood in the story might well be called “transitional” by a realtor these days to mean that people from many different backgrounds live there in what appears to be at least in part due to financial reasons. I happen to live in a neighborhood like this with extravagant homes very close by but my great subdivision is considered tainted because we cross over one block over the “line” which is Buford Highway.
The art work by Choi is done appropriately. The European family has lighter skin tone than the people of color that populate most of the book. The artwork of the Chinese Dragon parade is vivid, realistic, and appealing. For the holiday meal our little fellow is pictured seated in a cross legged fashion on a pillow in his sockfeet at a low table. Their table and wall decorations are obviously from the Asian tradition. I do not know enough to differentiate between Chinese and Korean artwork and tablecloths. The most beautiful illustrations in the book are the full page spreads in bright yellow and green with a bit of orange that picture our young friend in the bathtub with bubbles of all sizes filling up the pages as the rubber ducky looks on and the pup tries to pop a bubble that has floated into the air. On the following page as doggy sits on the toilet seat trying to figure out what in the world his little master is doing by flossing his teeth. The last page of the book features our little man and his dog flying in the air. The boy looks very reminiscent of the young girl protagonist in Faith Ringold’s TAR BEACH in this picture and he too dreams of a better life “somewhere out there.”
THIS NEXT NEW YEAR is a bright warm book portraying the author’s ideas about how immigrants, especially Asian Pacific Americans, can become a piece of the American Pie without loosing their cultural ingredients.
D. REVIEW EXCERPTS:
Amazon.com editorializes: "Yangsook Choi's artfully composed, action-packed paintings add uplifting color to the happy spirit of the holiday, and an author's note provides more details about the Chinese New Year and Wong's childhood memories of the celebration. This delightful picture book makes a fine addition to the small collection of Chinese New Year books, distinguishing itself with the narrator's endearingly persistent quest for luck: "They say you are coming into money / when your palms itch, / and my palms have been itching for days. / My brother thinks it's warts, / but I know luck is coming." (Ages 4 to 8) --Emilie Coulter
School Library Journal opines, " The narrator's mother cooks a special Korean soup, and his family observes the traditions of house cleaning, lighting firecrackers, and being extra good to ensure a lucky new year. Wong carefully and clearly presents the reasons behind the rituals in a manner understandable to young children. She explains in an appended note about her own confusion as a child about the timing and meaning of the holiday. Choi's vibrant, somewhat primitive paintings realistically capture the details of and preparations for this hopeful time of year. Youngsters will enjoy the bright colors and the sense of motion and activity conveyed as the boy helps his mother clean, flosses his teeth, and cringes from the noise of the firecrackers. A good choice for anyone getting ready to celebrate Chinese New Year.
Anne Connor, Los Angeles Public Library
Reviews accessed from:
http://www.amazon.com/This-Next-Year-Janet-Wong/dp/0374355037/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-2255834-9114420?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1185497936&sr=1-1
E. CONNECTIONS
SAM AND THE LUCKY MONEY is another wonderful picturebook about Chinese New Year written with an insider's perspective by Karen Chinn.
``
LS 5903 MULTICULTURAL LITERATURE
A. Yep, Laurence SPRING PEARL: THE LAST FLOWER. New York: American
Girl, (Girls of Many Lands series), Pleasant Company Publications, 2002.
B. PLOT SUMMARY:
Set in China of the 1850’s we find our main character, 12 year old Pearl in a tough situation. Both of her parents have passed away, her mother most recently, and now Pearl has been invited to live with the family Sung. Pearl’s father was a brilliant artist and many of the influential people of Canton have pieces of his work. Her mother was a noteworthy seamstress and artist in her own right and her art was collected in the city as well. Pearl loves gardening and has enjoyed tending the grounds of their small home in an undesirable area of town. On one of her father’s well known paintings he adds a poem calling camellias “a pearl given by nature.” Her mother names her Spring Pearl after the camellia flower. Her parents were very humble people and more interested in serving others and enjoying the creation of their art rather than living in a more comfortable area of town. Her father, a known scholar teaches Pearl to read and write. Father and daughter write business and personal letters for people from all different areas of town and walks of life. Her father does not charge people for his services and that is one reason they live happily but in meager circumstances. Growing up in “The Rat’s Nest” side of town where often the stench of the Canton River was bothersome serves Pearl extremely well. She is street wise, clever, and full of brain and brawn. The British are warring after Hong Kong and the French get involved too. Pearl has many tasks to complete after her move. Learning to be friendly and non-intimidating with rich Master Sung’s wife and three daughters who are very high in the social strata but cannot read or write. Pearl recreates the garden that the Sung’s have let become overgrown after letting their gardener go in the tough financial times caused by war. With a start like a Cinderella story it turns out very differently! Pearl and a servant of the Sung’s sneak out to check on the progression of the war from the city center often and to check on Master Sung who has been beaten mercilessly and taken into custody for being a dissenter about numerous new war taxes. Pearl knows foreign merchants and people in high places because of the well known art work of her parents. She manages to bring Master Sung clothing, food, and medicine while he is being detained in horrific circumstances with little thought of her own welfare. She does this to thank him for giving her a new home and because her parents taught her their ethics well. Mistress Sung who grew up in the country comes to admire Pearl as does the oldest daughter. Pearl becomes loved and treated like part of the family near the end of the story after rescuing Master Sung and working with Mistress Sung to fight off looters to save their compound. She had wanted the love and the acceptance of the Sung’s and it had been hard won. In the end however, Pearl ventures out on her own to partner with her servant friend from the Sung household for a taste of freedom that a business partnership promises.
C. CRITICAL ANALYSIS (INCLUDING CULTURAL MARKERS)
With the story set in the Cantonese area of China there is no need to examine criteria about Asian Pacific Americans. Pearl is in her native country throughout the story. The book is strictly historical fiction but has the feel, at times, of a fleshed out fairytale. Pearl reminds me very much of the heroine in M.C. Helledorfer’s, 1991, THE MAPMAKER’S DAUGHTER as that strong and swashbuckling female also decides to strike out on her own in the end as she of poor origins has defended and won the Prince’s freedom from jail and torture and does not need his status to feel herself worthy.
Just as I did with my Bruchac selection I decided to test the talents of the author in what I thought was the lowest common denominator, popular series. Yep, of such international repute for so many years, could have put out a mediocre book in a series like this and it still would have won acclaim and good reviews. Also I wanted to read a Yep book that I had never heard of. If he writes better than this I just can’t imagine. There are detailed author’s notes at the end of the book and six pages of information and pictures from primary sources about the clothing, jewelry, food, costume, and scenes of war from 1850 or thereabouts. The book cover and title page have beautiful color spreads of Pearl in native costume of silk and bright colors. Even the borders around the first page of every chapter are beautifully illustrated with what looks like an antique lace pattern. Pearl’s skin tone, eye and hair color are dark and appropriate. In the pictures adjacent to the title page Pearl is drawn in a garden holding a camellia near a bonsai tree. There is a building in the background of the picture with a pagoda roof. This is how it should be because the setting is China in the 1850’s.
As Aoki mentions as a positive element of the narrative the story did reflect the changing roles of women in society and even more than that though I believe Pearl was certainly the exception rather than the rule. She gives the girls of old in the story and girls of today encouragement to transcend their accepted roles in society and to challenge artificial barriers of class, wealth, education, age, and gender. Pearl is definitely not a heroine that could be perceived as passive or docile, but she does respect the ways and edicts of the wealthy Sung family and try to earn her keep. She sacrifices and rescues Sung and family because she wants to repay his generosity for giving her a home. She learned from her family to help others with little regard for the cost and never to take advantage of someone’s misfortune whether writing letters or assisting in other ways. Pearl is polite, cooperative, and bright but certainly that was true of some young girls in similar situations to Pearl’s. We should not be so afraid of expressing the truth of a character real or fictional unless it is done to the extreme or all characters are portrayed in a predictable and stereotypical fashion. I was not bothered by this but personality traits and actions of Pearl might not have left some native critics pleased because she was a good and perfect child. She acted subservient to the new family in the beginning. That may be the reason I thought of the story as part fairy tale. It is like a legend or folktale when the all knowing and seeing one is the rescuer and Pearl certainly was. The book has many themes but the history of the Chinese and the cultural lessons shared with readers are the predominant ones along with the role the female plays in this story. The fact that a girl transcended her rank and became the savior of the family because she could speak English very well, fight, disguise herself was sly, street savvy, and knew more Chinese and foreign traders than the wealthy family she went to live with. So, yes, Pearl is a Super Hero in the novel. The from rags to prominence is an age old them in the oral and written tradition as well. Pearl’s parents were also perfect people, extremely talented, very poor but still philanthropic.
All the sub-characters of influential men are drawn out more carefully than in most juvenile novels. The wealthy men and women who collect the works of Pearl’s parents are not all bad or all good. One is in the armed services in opposition to the stance taken by Pearl and the Sung family. Once the war begins in earnest, he does display a bit of a heart by letting Pearl in to see Sung with a pass after Pearl sells him the last item her mother created for her, an elaborate jacket covered in camellias. Because of his respect for her parents he finally agrees to help Pearl a bit and shows her some of her father’s paintings in his office. Other similar characters of male authority figures are fleshed out a bit as well. Yep does an extraordinary job with the character of Mistress Sung. Seemingly a lady of luxury and blindly obeying the social mores for women of her period she changes as the influence of Pearl and the physically tough times of war unfold. She was a country girl and knew how to fashion a bayonet out of a broomstick and knife. She teaches Pearl some of her fighting tricks and they and Pearl’s friend Doggy, a Sung servant take turns protecting the wealthy compound.
The story is fine literature, historically accurate, and a novel that is very hard to put down. There is an overt sense of balance in the storyline, of characters, of the reaction of characters during the war, of the dress and customs of the times such as carrying items on a horizontally balanced bamboo pole, of middle class as well as wealthy people being carried in what these days would be called an easy chair covered with curtains
I found the dialog both humorous and touching.
Pearl describes,
“I was back in my room, changing into my
good jacket and trousers, when my jail rags caught my eye.
Those might be more suitable for a scout, so I slipped them
on instead. Then I braided my hair into a man’s queue.
In the loose blouse, and with a hat, I would pass for a boy.
Girls were always doing that in kung-fu novels.” (Yep, 143)
Pearl tells of being surrounded by soldiers in town as she and
Doggy go looking for news for the Sung household,
“When the sailor next to my captor, raised his rifle, I reached up and
grabbed the barrel. Stop, I said in English. We don’t mean
you any harm. The second soldier was so astonished he
lowered his gun. You can talk! Apparently he didn’t consider
Chinese real speech, but this didn’t seem like the time to
Correct him. Of course I can, I said. Quite well.” (Yep, 158)
Paraphrasing a proverb relating to a major sub theme of the story,
gardening: A weed is just a plant that hasn’t yet found its home.
D. REVIEW EXCERPTS
All 7 customer reviews on amazon.com give it a perfect 5 star review.
Professional reviews include Publisher’s Weekly, “Spring Pearl has a bit of both Cinderella (she's assigned menial chores at first) and Mary Lenox (she restores the Sungs' neglected garden), but she emerges a fully realized character. Offering his typically lively dialogue and strong supporting cast, Yep (Dragon's Gate) also integrates period detail into a well-honed plot. A "Then and Now" afterword draws on Yep's story to contrast conditions facing girls in 19th- century China with those today. Ages 9-12.
School Library Journal recommends the book for Grades 5-8. I see it more as a 3-6 grade, but regardless it is a wonderful story. SLJ: “Spring Pearl is orphaned at age 12 after her mother dies of poverty and overwork. Because her father was a scholar and an artist, his patron, Master Sung, takes her in. She is not welcomed by his wife or daughters, but she endures. At her new home, she intimidates her hosts by speaking knowledgeably on scholarly topics and defeating the eldest son at chess and dominoes. In fact, her ability to read, write, and speak English is quite staggering. Nevertheless, this is 1857 in Canton, and the Chinese are struggling in the Opium War against Great Britain and France. When Master Sung is imprisoned for protesting extra taxes, Spring Pearl is the only one who can save him. Her good deeds win over Mistress Sung, who entrusts her with running the household. Amazingly, the child has friends among the British invaders and the looting Chinese thugs, and saves the Sung family at every turn. They open their arms to her as family, but she chooses freedom. Girls craving adventurous heroines will be drawn to the story, but it leans more toward historical fantasy than fiction.
Be Astengo, Alachua County Library, Gainesville, FL
Reviews accessed at:
http://www.amazon.com/Spring-Pearl-Flower-Girls-Lands/dp/1584855193/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/103-7575722-4136600?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1185472315&sr=1-1
via comcast.net
E. CONNECTIONS:
Yep has written many many novels for elementary and middle school children. He usually uses themes of history of the Chinese culture, the role of women, Asian Pacific Americans learning to fit in at school and in their new communities.
As mentioned earlier, M.C. Helldorfer wrote a book with similar themes regarding males and females and transcending and rising above gender expectations about adventure, daring, and self dependency.
Probably the best “what do I read next” reader’s advisory would be to look at the other books in the “Girls of Many Lands” series put out by an arm of the American Girl Company.
Girl, (Girls of Many Lands series), Pleasant Company Publications, 2002.
B. PLOT SUMMARY:
Set in China of the 1850’s we find our main character, 12 year old Pearl in a tough situation. Both of her parents have passed away, her mother most recently, and now Pearl has been invited to live with the family Sung. Pearl’s father was a brilliant artist and many of the influential people of Canton have pieces of his work. Her mother was a noteworthy seamstress and artist in her own right and her art was collected in the city as well. Pearl loves gardening and has enjoyed tending the grounds of their small home in an undesirable area of town. On one of her father’s well known paintings he adds a poem calling camellias “a pearl given by nature.” Her mother names her Spring Pearl after the camellia flower. Her parents were very humble people and more interested in serving others and enjoying the creation of their art rather than living in a more comfortable area of town. Her father, a known scholar teaches Pearl to read and write. Father and daughter write business and personal letters for people from all different areas of town and walks of life. Her father does not charge people for his services and that is one reason they live happily but in meager circumstances. Growing up in “The Rat’s Nest” side of town where often the stench of the Canton River was bothersome serves Pearl extremely well. She is street wise, clever, and full of brain and brawn. The British are warring after Hong Kong and the French get involved too. Pearl has many tasks to complete after her move. Learning to be friendly and non-intimidating with rich Master Sung’s wife and three daughters who are very high in the social strata but cannot read or write. Pearl recreates the garden that the Sung’s have let become overgrown after letting their gardener go in the tough financial times caused by war. With a start like a Cinderella story it turns out very differently! Pearl and a servant of the Sung’s sneak out to check on the progression of the war from the city center often and to check on Master Sung who has been beaten mercilessly and taken into custody for being a dissenter about numerous new war taxes. Pearl knows foreign merchants and people in high places because of the well known art work of her parents. She manages to bring Master Sung clothing, food, and medicine while he is being detained in horrific circumstances with little thought of her own welfare. She does this to thank him for giving her a new home and because her parents taught her their ethics well. Mistress Sung who grew up in the country comes to admire Pearl as does the oldest daughter. Pearl becomes loved and treated like part of the family near the end of the story after rescuing Master Sung and working with Mistress Sung to fight off looters to save their compound. She had wanted the love and the acceptance of the Sung’s and it had been hard won. In the end however, Pearl ventures out on her own to partner with her servant friend from the Sung household for a taste of freedom that a business partnership promises.
C. CRITICAL ANALYSIS (INCLUDING CULTURAL MARKERS)
With the story set in the Cantonese area of China there is no need to examine criteria about Asian Pacific Americans. Pearl is in her native country throughout the story. The book is strictly historical fiction but has the feel, at times, of a fleshed out fairytale. Pearl reminds me very much of the heroine in M.C. Helledorfer’s, 1991, THE MAPMAKER’S DAUGHTER as that strong and swashbuckling female also decides to strike out on her own in the end as she of poor origins has defended and won the Prince’s freedom from jail and torture and does not need his status to feel herself worthy.
Just as I did with my Bruchac selection I decided to test the talents of the author in what I thought was the lowest common denominator, popular series. Yep, of such international repute for so many years, could have put out a mediocre book in a series like this and it still would have won acclaim and good reviews. Also I wanted to read a Yep book that I had never heard of. If he writes better than this I just can’t imagine. There are detailed author’s notes at the end of the book and six pages of information and pictures from primary sources about the clothing, jewelry, food, costume, and scenes of war from 1850 or thereabouts. The book cover and title page have beautiful color spreads of Pearl in native costume of silk and bright colors. Even the borders around the first page of every chapter are beautifully illustrated with what looks like an antique lace pattern. Pearl’s skin tone, eye and hair color are dark and appropriate. In the pictures adjacent to the title page Pearl is drawn in a garden holding a camellia near a bonsai tree. There is a building in the background of the picture with a pagoda roof. This is how it should be because the setting is China in the 1850’s.
As Aoki mentions as a positive element of the narrative the story did reflect the changing roles of women in society and even more than that though I believe Pearl was certainly the exception rather than the rule. She gives the girls of old in the story and girls of today encouragement to transcend their accepted roles in society and to challenge artificial barriers of class, wealth, education, age, and gender. Pearl is definitely not a heroine that could be perceived as passive or docile, but she does respect the ways and edicts of the wealthy Sung family and try to earn her keep. She sacrifices and rescues Sung and family because she wants to repay his generosity for giving her a home. She learned from her family to help others with little regard for the cost and never to take advantage of someone’s misfortune whether writing letters or assisting in other ways. Pearl is polite, cooperative, and bright but certainly that was true of some young girls in similar situations to Pearl’s. We should not be so afraid of expressing the truth of a character real or fictional unless it is done to the extreme or all characters are portrayed in a predictable and stereotypical fashion. I was not bothered by this but personality traits and actions of Pearl might not have left some native critics pleased because she was a good and perfect child. She acted subservient to the new family in the beginning. That may be the reason I thought of the story as part fairy tale. It is like a legend or folktale when the all knowing and seeing one is the rescuer and Pearl certainly was. The book has many themes but the history of the Chinese and the cultural lessons shared with readers are the predominant ones along with the role the female plays in this story. The fact that a girl transcended her rank and became the savior of the family because she could speak English very well, fight, disguise herself was sly, street savvy, and knew more Chinese and foreign traders than the wealthy family she went to live with. So, yes, Pearl is a Super Hero in the novel. The from rags to prominence is an age old them in the oral and written tradition as well. Pearl’s parents were also perfect people, extremely talented, very poor but still philanthropic.
All the sub-characters of influential men are drawn out more carefully than in most juvenile novels. The wealthy men and women who collect the works of Pearl’s parents are not all bad or all good. One is in the armed services in opposition to the stance taken by Pearl and the Sung family. Once the war begins in earnest, he does display a bit of a heart by letting Pearl in to see Sung with a pass after Pearl sells him the last item her mother created for her, an elaborate jacket covered in camellias. Because of his respect for her parents he finally agrees to help Pearl a bit and shows her some of her father’s paintings in his office. Other similar characters of male authority figures are fleshed out a bit as well. Yep does an extraordinary job with the character of Mistress Sung. Seemingly a lady of luxury and blindly obeying the social mores for women of her period she changes as the influence of Pearl and the physically tough times of war unfold. She was a country girl and knew how to fashion a bayonet out of a broomstick and knife. She teaches Pearl some of her fighting tricks and they and Pearl’s friend Doggy, a Sung servant take turns protecting the wealthy compound.
The story is fine literature, historically accurate, and a novel that is very hard to put down. There is an overt sense of balance in the storyline, of characters, of the reaction of characters during the war, of the dress and customs of the times such as carrying items on a horizontally balanced bamboo pole, of middle class as well as wealthy people being carried in what these days would be called an easy chair covered with curtains
I found the dialog both humorous and touching.
Pearl describes,
“I was back in my room, changing into my
good jacket and trousers, when my jail rags caught my eye.
Those might be more suitable for a scout, so I slipped them
on instead. Then I braided my hair into a man’s queue.
In the loose blouse, and with a hat, I would pass for a boy.
Girls were always doing that in kung-fu novels.” (Yep, 143)
Pearl tells of being surrounded by soldiers in town as she and
Doggy go looking for news for the Sung household,
“When the sailor next to my captor, raised his rifle, I reached up and
grabbed the barrel. Stop, I said in English. We don’t mean
you any harm. The second soldier was so astonished he
lowered his gun. You can talk! Apparently he didn’t consider
Chinese real speech, but this didn’t seem like the time to
Correct him. Of course I can, I said. Quite well.” (Yep, 158)
Paraphrasing a proverb relating to a major sub theme of the story,
gardening: A weed is just a plant that hasn’t yet found its home.
D. REVIEW EXCERPTS
All 7 customer reviews on amazon.com give it a perfect 5 star review.
Professional reviews include Publisher’s Weekly, “Spring Pearl has a bit of both Cinderella (she's assigned menial chores at first) and Mary Lenox (she restores the Sungs' neglected garden), but she emerges a fully realized character. Offering his typically lively dialogue and strong supporting cast, Yep (Dragon's Gate) also integrates period detail into a well-honed plot. A "Then and Now" afterword draws on Yep's story to contrast conditions facing girls in 19th- century China with those today. Ages 9-12.
School Library Journal recommends the book for Grades 5-8. I see it more as a 3-6 grade, but regardless it is a wonderful story. SLJ: “Spring Pearl is orphaned at age 12 after her mother dies of poverty and overwork. Because her father was a scholar and an artist, his patron, Master Sung, takes her in. She is not welcomed by his wife or daughters, but she endures. At her new home, she intimidates her hosts by speaking knowledgeably on scholarly topics and defeating the eldest son at chess and dominoes. In fact, her ability to read, write, and speak English is quite staggering. Nevertheless, this is 1857 in Canton, and the Chinese are struggling in the Opium War against Great Britain and France. When Master Sung is imprisoned for protesting extra taxes, Spring Pearl is the only one who can save him. Her good deeds win over Mistress Sung, who entrusts her with running the household. Amazingly, the child has friends among the British invaders and the looting Chinese thugs, and saves the Sung family at every turn. They open their arms to her as family, but she chooses freedom. Girls craving adventurous heroines will be drawn to the story, but it leans more toward historical fantasy than fiction.
Be Astengo, Alachua County Library, Gainesville, FL
Reviews accessed at:
http://www.amazon.com/Spring-Pearl-Flower-Girls-Lands/dp/1584855193/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/103-7575722-4136600?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1185472315&sr=1-1
via comcast.net
E. CONNECTIONS:
Yep has written many many novels for elementary and middle school children. He usually uses themes of history of the Chinese culture, the role of women, Asian Pacific Americans learning to fit in at school and in their new communities.
As mentioned earlier, M.C. Helldorfer wrote a book with similar themes regarding males and females and transcending and rising above gender expectations about adventure, daring, and self dependency.
Probably the best “what do I read next” reader’s advisory would be to look at the other books in the “Girls of Many Lands” series put out by an arm of the American Girl Company.
Saturday, July 14, 2007
LS 5903 MULTICULTURAL LITERATURE
A. Bruchac, Joseph. THE TRAIL OF TEARS. New York: Random House, 1999. Illustrated by Diana Magnuson.
B. PLOT SUMMARY
Bruchac’s Step into Reading title tells of the difficult period of history out of which the “Trail of Tears” was born. Tracing the early history of Cherokee life from their Southeastern existence before the white man arrived and ending with the Cherokees of today, Bruchac tells us carefully, simply, and truthfully about the abuses and deception that the United States perpetuated upon the Cherokee Nation. Listing federal and state government methods of removing the Cherokee from their native lands, Bruchac traces the fate of the Cherokee Nation during the Presidencies of Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, and Martin Van Buren. The story of Sequoyah and the alphabet he created, of Chief John Ross and his family, the move to New Echota, and the journey to Oklahoma are all detailed by Native American, Bruchac in a simple straightforward style of writing.
C. CRITICAL ANALYSIS (INCLUDING CULTURAL MARKERS)
I went to a huge Atlanta Barnes & Noble near my home to look for children’s books about Native Americans written by Native American authors. I was already reading Geronimo for class so this was not actually meant to be a reviewed selection. The reason I have chosen to talk about it now is it was the only book for young people written by a Native American about Native Americans in the entire store. The book was shelved with the paperback fiction section but the book is actually a true story of the Indian removal from the Southeast. Being the only book that a child could chose about Native Americans except for the tainted ANNIE AND THE OLD ONE, KNOTS ON A COUNTING ROPE, BROTHER EAGLE, SISTER SKY and the ROUGH FACED GIRL written by a non-Native American I decided I needed to read and dissect it a bit.
The illustrations are powerful and effective which is not always the case in the “Step into Reading”, “Rookie Reader”, “I can read it all by myself” genre of books and selection of titles. Bruchac gives a very balanced tale of early Cherokee history as well as the removal that caused the trail of tears. Mr. Bruchac states the amazing truth about the economy of the times as he tells us that, “Each Cherokee was given an allowance of $65.88. This would cover the cost of wagons, horses and oxen, bedding, food, soap, and clothing. They would also have to pay to use the turnpikes—private roads whose owners demanded money for their use.” Bruchac mentioned a melancholy part of the story when the very small group of wealthy Cherokees signed a treaty stating that all Cherokees would cede their lands and move Westward. John Ross and the rest of the Cherokees opposed that treaty and they claimed it was illegal since it was not explained to, signed by or ratified by the majority of the Cherokee Nation. John Quincy Adams, founding father and former President made his views known clearly as a then elder statesman saying that he believed the treaty brought disgrace to the United States.
The pictures aim for authenticity. Sequoyah is pictured with the characteristic turban and pipe seen in several photographs of the time. There are pictures of Indians of the past dressing like white men and pictures of Indians in their native dress. The Cherokee rose flower is not mentioned in the book but Cherokee rose stones found near the Arkansas river in the direction of Oklahoma were said to have been created by a single drop of Cherokee blood. These red gemstones are still found in that area to this day. Bruchac tells of the 1,000 or so Indians who refused to flee from North Carolina or escaped to return there. Today they are 10,000 strong. Talking about the 80,000 Cherokees in Oklahoma Bruchac makes a point of saying that the Carolina and Western Cherokees are in fact two separate Cherokee Nations. He talks with pride of the thriving economy of the Oklahoma Cherokee and their system of tribal government. These Cherokee of modern day Oklahoma are drawn wearing typical middle class garments and hairstyles. The book effectively takes us from the past to the present in realistic terms.
Bruchac’s insider status helps make the story honest and truthful, painful at times but not sentimental. He has done a fine job talking about the past and present Cherokee and their turbulent story. Mr. Bruchac also sees the lesson to be learned as, “when promises are broken, many people may suffer.” Interpreting the Trail of Tears as a story of hope and resilience Bruchac will keep his audience and give them much to think about.
Again, I must admit my prejudice about reading much less reviewing a title from the “Step into reading, ready for chapters”. For this type of book I would say it is a good deal better than most. My instinct is that a reluctant reader or an advanced one may enjoy the book and it would well serve as a springboard for further exploration of the role of Native Americans in U.S. history. Being a educational snob about this type of book is a bit limiting. Aren’t we glad that Dr. Seuss’ friend P.D. Eastman wrote so many wonderful Beginner books?
I read so many non-fiction books of this type when I was very young and bored with books I deemed as “silly” as did my daughter. Still my gut instinct after 23 years of working with children and libraries is that it would do best as a motivation reading selection for male reluctant readers.
D. REVIEW EXCERPTS
I was not able to locate any journal reviews. The series has been reviewed and gotten high marks from time to time but the separate title has not been the subject of review. There are positive customer reviews on many sites. Amazon.com customer’s give it a 4.5 out of 5 possible stars.
E. CONNECTIONS
Bruchac has written many, many books about Native Americans for children of all ages. His story of Sacagawea has gotten nothing but rave reviews. I very much enjoyed his historical fiction novel entitled GERONIMO. SKELETON MAN and THE RETURN OF SKELETON MAN are also recommended but are for readers that are overall a bit more advanced than is necessary for reading, understanding and enjoying THE TRAIL OF TEARS.
B. PLOT SUMMARY
Bruchac’s Step into Reading title tells of the difficult period of history out of which the “Trail of Tears” was born. Tracing the early history of Cherokee life from their Southeastern existence before the white man arrived and ending with the Cherokees of today, Bruchac tells us carefully, simply, and truthfully about the abuses and deception that the United States perpetuated upon the Cherokee Nation. Listing federal and state government methods of removing the Cherokee from their native lands, Bruchac traces the fate of the Cherokee Nation during the Presidencies of Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, and Martin Van Buren. The story of Sequoyah and the alphabet he created, of Chief John Ross and his family, the move to New Echota, and the journey to Oklahoma are all detailed by Native American, Bruchac in a simple straightforward style of writing.
C. CRITICAL ANALYSIS (INCLUDING CULTURAL MARKERS)
I went to a huge Atlanta Barnes & Noble near my home to look for children’s books about Native Americans written by Native American authors. I was already reading Geronimo for class so this was not actually meant to be a reviewed selection. The reason I have chosen to talk about it now is it was the only book for young people written by a Native American about Native Americans in the entire store. The book was shelved with the paperback fiction section but the book is actually a true story of the Indian removal from the Southeast. Being the only book that a child could chose about Native Americans except for the tainted ANNIE AND THE OLD ONE, KNOTS ON A COUNTING ROPE, BROTHER EAGLE, SISTER SKY and the ROUGH FACED GIRL written by a non-Native American I decided I needed to read and dissect it a bit.
The illustrations are powerful and effective which is not always the case in the “Step into Reading”, “Rookie Reader”, “I can read it all by myself” genre of books and selection of titles. Bruchac gives a very balanced tale of early Cherokee history as well as the removal that caused the trail of tears. Mr. Bruchac states the amazing truth about the economy of the times as he tells us that, “Each Cherokee was given an allowance of $65.88. This would cover the cost of wagons, horses and oxen, bedding, food, soap, and clothing. They would also have to pay to use the turnpikes—private roads whose owners demanded money for their use.” Bruchac mentioned a melancholy part of the story when the very small group of wealthy Cherokees signed a treaty stating that all Cherokees would cede their lands and move Westward. John Ross and the rest of the Cherokees opposed that treaty and they claimed it was illegal since it was not explained to, signed by or ratified by the majority of the Cherokee Nation. John Quincy Adams, founding father and former President made his views known clearly as a then elder statesman saying that he believed the treaty brought disgrace to the United States.
The pictures aim for authenticity. Sequoyah is pictured with the characteristic turban and pipe seen in several photographs of the time. There are pictures of Indians of the past dressing like white men and pictures of Indians in their native dress. The Cherokee rose flower is not mentioned in the book but Cherokee rose stones found near the Arkansas river in the direction of Oklahoma were said to have been created by a single drop of Cherokee blood. These red gemstones are still found in that area to this day. Bruchac tells of the 1,000 or so Indians who refused to flee from North Carolina or escaped to return there. Today they are 10,000 strong. Talking about the 80,000 Cherokees in Oklahoma Bruchac makes a point of saying that the Carolina and Western Cherokees are in fact two separate Cherokee Nations. He talks with pride of the thriving economy of the Oklahoma Cherokee and their system of tribal government. These Cherokee of modern day Oklahoma are drawn wearing typical middle class garments and hairstyles. The book effectively takes us from the past to the present in realistic terms.
Bruchac’s insider status helps make the story honest and truthful, painful at times but not sentimental. He has done a fine job talking about the past and present Cherokee and their turbulent story. Mr. Bruchac also sees the lesson to be learned as, “when promises are broken, many people may suffer.” Interpreting the Trail of Tears as a story of hope and resilience Bruchac will keep his audience and give them much to think about.
Again, I must admit my prejudice about reading much less reviewing a title from the “Step into reading, ready for chapters”. For this type of book I would say it is a good deal better than most. My instinct is that a reluctant reader or an advanced one may enjoy the book and it would well serve as a springboard for further exploration of the role of Native Americans in U.S. history. Being a educational snob about this type of book is a bit limiting. Aren’t we glad that Dr. Seuss’ friend P.D. Eastman wrote so many wonderful Beginner books?
I read so many non-fiction books of this type when I was very young and bored with books I deemed as “silly” as did my daughter. Still my gut instinct after 23 years of working with children and libraries is that it would do best as a motivation reading selection for male reluctant readers.
D. REVIEW EXCERPTS
I was not able to locate any journal reviews. The series has been reviewed and gotten high marks from time to time but the separate title has not been the subject of review. There are positive customer reviews on many sites. Amazon.com customer’s give it a 4.5 out of 5 possible stars.
E. CONNECTIONS
Bruchac has written many, many books about Native Americans for children of all ages. His story of Sacagawea has gotten nothing but rave reviews. I very much enjoyed his historical fiction novel entitled GERONIMO. SKELETON MAN and THE RETURN OF SKELETON MAN are also recommended but are for readers that are overall a bit more advanced than is necessary for reading, understanding and enjoying THE TRAIL OF TEARS.
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