Hatch by Kenneth Oppel

Hatch, the second novel in Kenneth Oppel's Overthrow trilogy, picks up exactly where the first book, Bloom left off. The spraying of Stanley Park with an experimental herbicide appears to be working.  The cryptogenic black grass and vines that have spread throughout the world, "crowding out crops, sending strangling vines into houses, waiting underground to trap and eat animals and people in the acid-filled sacs" are dying. However, Petra, Anaya and Seth's joy is cut short when it begins to rain, not just raindrops but "gleaming, translucent beads" that quickly burst, releasing some kind of new life form. Anaya, realizing what they are, acts quickly to trap some eggs into a coffee cup. 

In the lab they discover that there are several new and frightening cryptogenic life forms that quickly try to hide. These are another part of the alien ecosystem that is invading Earth. Suddenly, Colonel Pearson arrives with soldiers, informing them that the lab is now under the authority of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) and that the children are to be taken to holding cells downstairs.

All three teens are interrogated by Dr. Ritter who is in charge of a special task force in the United States, along with Dr. Weber and Colonel Pearson. Dr. Ritter informs Petra, that MRI scans of their brains have revealed that they have something in their brains that transmits radio pulses. On the morning the black grass began dying, the comms team picked up powerful radio pulses coming from where the three teens were sleeping. Dr. Weber believes that the children are transmitting biological data to the cryptogens to see if they can survive on Earth. They are also able to receive transmissions, as Seth's strange dreams seem to prove. After his interrogation of Seth, Ritter determines they are a threat and has the three teens transported to a secure location in the United States.

In the new location, they are given medical exams, ordered into jumpsuits identified with W for water, L for land and A for air and taken to a gymnasium where there are many other kids like them. Paul Samson, a military intelligence officer tells Petra that they are in an underground bunker that blocks all radio communication. 

The three teens make new friends with those who are undergoing similar changes; Petra meets a boy named Darren who is shedding skin, growing a tail but who also has a unique patterning developing on his body, Anaya meets Charles who seems super smart, and Seth meets Esta a flyer like himself but who is very angry.  In the gym, everyone is being evaluated; the runners are encouraged to run treadmills and practice jumping, the flyers to use their sharp feathers to slash and to try to fly, and the swimmers are evaluated for endurance by holding their breath. While Darren is certain they are being trained as soldiers, Petra believes they are simply being studied.

At bedtime, Dr. Ritter takes Anaya out of the bunker and mildly sedates her so that she can transmit with the cryptogens, allowing them to locate the source of the radio pulses. While sedated, Anaya begins to communicate with a cryptogen, named Terra, hearing the word, "help". Back in the dormitory that night, Anaya tells Petra what she experienced and tells her the presence felt motherly.

The next day Seth reveals that he and Esta have discovered that they can communicate telepathically. Petra and Anaya also have this ability. Petra wants to tell Dr. Ritter but the others are against this. After a nuclear attack on the cryptogenic ship fails, Ritter has Anaya attempt to contact the cryptogens again. When the transmission ends abruptly, Ritter accuses Anaya of stopping it. However, Anaya finds that the cryptogen has implanted in her mind a box that shows her what happened to the cryptogen's world. A war between the three major species resulted in the enslavement of the runners and swimmers by the flyers who could destroy the other two using a kind of sound weapon. The runners and swimmers were made to forge spacecrafts and were eventually loaded onto these ships as slave soldiers. These ships docked together to become the ship now orbiting Earth. 

Petra decides to tell Paul Samson about Anaya's vision. However, unknown to her, Ritter has heard everything and has many questions about what Anaya's experienced. The next day, during an unexpected birthday party, Ritter informs the teens that they will be implementing a protocol to remove the changes they are experiencing with the goal of returning all of them to their human selves. Petra, Anaya, Seth, Darren, Charles and Esta argue about what this means. Petra also reveals that she's told Ritter about Anaya's vision and that he knows about their telepathic abilities through monitoring the radio activity. 

Seth now believes they need to escape, but Petra and Charles are against the idea. Their views change when Seth is taken away after he and Darren fight, and Esta who likes Seth, uses telepathic sound to hurt Darren. After goading Seth to hurt him, Dr. Ritter tells him he plans to remove Seth's transmitting organ in his brain. Meanwhile, Petra approaches Paul to tell him that it was Esta who hurt Darren, not Seth. Paul tells Petra that they are no longer safe at the bunker and that he's contacted Dr. Weber to help them escape.

During their escape, Seth and Esta become separated from Anaya and Petra who are safely taken back to Deadman's Island. There, Anaya continues receives more messages from the cryptogen Terra who claims to be a runner who is awake in the ship. She promises to help Anaya and arranges a meeting. But the rendezvous appears to be a trap as it seems the final battle for their planet is just beginning.

Discussion

Hatch is an exciting second novel in the Overthrow trilogy by Canadian author Kenneth Oppel. In this novel, readers learn about the cryptogen's world and how they came to Earth, although their reason for doing so is not yet clear. But the main focus is on the continuing terraforming of Earth to suit the cryptogens as well as the developing abilities of Seth, Anaya and Petra and the other teens like them and the role they may play in all of this.

As the two girls, Anaya and Petra watch their bodies changing to be come more and more alien, both struggle with their identity, with the changes and who and what they are becoming. Anaya who has never considered herself pretty and who was not athletic before the changes began, finds she has incredible stamina on the treadmill. When she is complimented by Charles, Anaya thinks, "...she was pleased by his compliment. I like myself better like this. The moment she had the thought she realized how crazy it sounded. But it was true. She liked this new, healthier, stronger version of herself."

For Petra, the changes make her worried she won't be loved. When Seth, whom she is attracted to, leaves their group for Esta, Petra believes she's no longer pretty. Anaya remembers "...how Petra had confided her worst fear to her: she was terrified that if her body changed, she'd become monstrous and no one could ever love her." Petra asks Anaya, "I'm still me, right?" Although Anaya answers in the affirmative, she wonders. "...lately she'd caught herself wondering if it was true. Everything that had happened to her body -- her speed, her strength, her brain that could talk to an alien species -- it had started to change how she thought. And wasn't that an inside change?..."

In contrast to the girls, Seth and Darren both like the changes that are happening to their bodies. Darren sees himself as a soldier, while Seth, who's been dreaming of flying for years, sees the changes he's experiencing as good. Unlike Petra who volunteers to have surgery to remove her cryptogenic features, Seth is determined to keep his.

However, as the changes continue, the three teens begin to feel less and less human and notice they are becoming more like the cryptogens. For example, they begin to notice that they crave cryptogen plants and animals. When Darren orders a Big Mac and fries, he finds this favourite food suddenly doesn't taste very good.  Seth, who along with Esta and Sienna eats the flesh of an insect he has killed, and finds it delicious. "As he chewed, he felt like the meat was satisfying a hunger he'd never known he had. It tasted right. He couldn't believe he'd gone so long without it." Anaya finds a black vine growing up from the pavement on Deadman's Island and eats not only the red berries but the entire vine itself too. And Petra gobbles the eggs she is supposed to capture in the bay, finding them "deliciously salty."

Petra tells Anaya she feels like a monster for eating an egg and finally admits, "We're changing. We have no control over ourselves. What're we going to do next?" Anaya admits that since they are part cryptogen, they are behaving as they do, eating what they eat. Petra questions what they are becoming. "Remember when you said, I'm still me? What if it's not like that? What if we're not going to stay the same inside? What if we're going to change on the outside and the inside? What if we start thinking like them?"

Later on Anaya, after the death of Petra's mother wonders if she might be right about the changes."They had changed. They weren't the same people, even on the inside. Petra craved cryptogenic insects, she loved being underwater, and she had a venomous tail that seemed to act on its own. And she, Anaya, felt the same kind of hunger for cryptogenic plants. But the biggest change for her was the powerful mental connection to Terra, which seemed to guide her own thoughts. Was she being brainwashed?"

Overall, Hatch is a good second novel that sets the stage for the arrival of the cryptogens and the final showdown. There's plenty of gross monsters and heart-pounding battles between the teens and these alien life forms to keep readers engaged and wanting more. At the same time, Terra, the cryptogen who has been communicating with Anaya offers enough mystery as to whether she's really on the side of the humans and is part of a "resistance" as she claims, or simply misleading the young girl. And readers are left to wonder which side will the three teens choose, as they become more and more like the invading aliens.

The final installment, Thrive, will be published in May, 2021.

Book Details:

Hatch by Kenneth Oppel
Toronto: HarperCollins Publishing Ltd.   2020
397 pp

Where Are You, Agnes? by Tessa McWatt

 Agnes and her elderly grandfather see a rainbow one day. When her grandfather asks her what her what she thinks, she tells him the rainbow is beautiful. He then covers her eyes and asks her, if it is still beautiful, to which Agnes replies that it is! She wonders if everyone thinks like this, and her grandfather tells her that he's not sure.

Agnes draws every day, whatever she sees, the birds, the sun, the "shapes she saw in the whet, in the tractor tires and the diamond-shaped lines on the backs of snakes." Agnes was so intent on her drawing that she often did not hear her mother when she called her. 

One day Agnes' grandfather moved their family from the farm to the city. She missed the birds, the snakes, the rows of wheat. Instead she saw bugs, and the patterns they made in the dirt. So Agnes began drawing insects. To her brothers and sister these seemed ugly but when she drew them, she felt the beauty of the rainbow returning. Again, Agnes was so intent on her drawing that she did not hear her mother when she called her.

One day she asked her grandfather who was much older now, why things must disappear. But he did not have an answer. Agnes missed the feeling the rainbow. She asked her grandfather how she could paint a real tree and he told her that although the tree will not last forever, she will see it in other places and it's beauty will be in her heart.

With the death of her grandfather, Agnes was deeply sad. She remembered what her grandfather had told her and discovered she could see beauty in many places, but most of all that beauty was in her mind, through the memories of what she'd seen.

Discussion

In Where Are You, Agnes?, Tessa McWatt attempts to portray the motivation behind Agnes Martin's artwork. Agnes was a 20th century abstract expressionist who was born and grew up in Canada but who spent most of her adult life in the United States.

Born in 1912, in rural Saskatchewan to Scottish Presbyterian parents, Agnes grew up in a home that was stern, her mother often using silence as a punishment. After spending time teaching in remote schools in the Pacific Northwest, Agnes moved to New York City in 1941. There she studied fine art at Teacher's College, Columbia University.

The next fifteen years were spent developing her painting skills by attending schools in New York and New Mexico. Eventually Agnes settled into a art community in lower Manhattan.  During this period, Agnes struggled with mental health issues. She eventually left New York in 1967 after winning a grant, and ended up in New Mexico.She lived a very minimalist lifestyle that likely would be attractive to some today, building her own home and studio on a mesa in Cuba, New Mexico. She stayed in the desert, painting her unusual art, that often led people to vandalize her paintings. Agnes eventually left her home and moved to a retirement home in Taos, New Mexico. She passed away in 2004.

McWatt adapts an anecdote from Agnes's life to portray the driving motivation behind Agnes Martin's  art. From her Author's Note in the back, McWatt writes, "Agnes once watched a young girl staring at a rose. She asked the girl if she thought the rose was beautiful, to which the girl said yes. Then Agnes took the rose and hid it behind her back. 'Is  it still beautiful?' she asked the girl.The girl agreed that it was, and Agnes told her that was because beauty exists in the mind."   McWatt believes this concept about beauty might have come from Agnes' grandfather with whom she spent a great deal of time while growing up. It is this abstract idea McWatt attempts to portray her picture book with Agnes questioning her grandfather as to how she can capture the beauty of an object like a rainbow or a tree if it isn't permanent. The answer as McWatt notes in her Author's Note, is that beauty doesn't lie within objects such as a rose, but that "Beauty is an awareness in the mind."  McWatt attempts to explain this concept to young readers with the unusual sentence,  "She ran home and painted this...and that...and everything, until she painted what was on the inside walls of her mind." Without the Author's Note at the back, I'm not sure most adults would understand what McWatt was attempting to convey in her story, but perhaps abstract expressionism is a difficult art form to comprehend.

Award-winning children's book illustrator, Zuzanna Celej has created soft, subdued illustrations for the story, using a palette of greys and sepia. The illustrations hint at the character of Agnes Martin's art, incorporating a similar palette, and grid lines while blending in prairie and urban scenes. Celej's illustrations were rendered in watercolour, collage and coloured pencils on paper. You can view some of Agnes Martin's work at Architectural Digest.

Book Details:

Where Are You, Agnes? by Tessa McWatt
Toronto: Groundwood Books/House of Anansi Press    2020

The Engima Game by Elizabeth Wein

The Enigma Game is another wonderful story by young adult author Elizabeth Wein whose superb writing captures life in northern Scotland during World War II.

The story's narrative weaves between the following three characters. Nineteen-year-old  Flight Lieutenant James G. Beaufort-Stuart leads 648 Squadron B-Flight which includes the Madeira and Pimms sections. The 648 squadron fly Bristol Blenheims on low-level bombing raids targeting German ships in the North Sea. Before his next mission, Stuart confronts his Wing Commander, Talbot Cromwell, who was recently moved to Shetland as the Battle of Britain ended. Cromwell is use to commanding a squadron of new Spitfire fighters, fast and agile. He wants the 648 Squadron to fly at twenty thousand feet which means hitting any target at that height is almost impossible. When Stuart argues with Cromwell about his battle tactics, he is accused of lacking "moral fiber", a euphemism for cowardice. Cromwell doesn't want them flying low because they are targeted by the German's anti-aircraft guns.

In fact Stuart's squadron suffers more losses that night as he leads them on a mission over the North Sea. In his plane, is his navigator  twenty-one-year-old David Silvermont and their gunner and wireless operator, Colin Oldham. When their plane is attacked by a German Messerschmitt 110 over the North Sea, Stuart manages to dive down to sea level. But Colin is killed when the gunner's turret is hit. Back at base, Stuart is angry and determined, even if that means cheating to beat the Germans.

Fifteen-year-old Louisa Adair finds herself alone in London. Her parents had moved to England from Jamaica when she was twelve-years-old. They'd left Kingston, Jamaica because her mother "was afraid of the workers' strikes and Caribbean riots".

Louisa's parents were killed in the same week the previous month. Her mother Caroline, a white Englishwoman was killed when the front of the bus she was in fell into a crater when the Balham tube station was bombed. Her father Lenford, a Black Jamaican and a merchant seaman, was killed three days after her mother died, when his ship was torpedoed. 

Now alone in their flat at 88 Gibraltar Road, Louisa knows she has to find work otherwise she will end up living in an air-raid shelter. Going back to Jamaica isn't an option because it would mean a life of hardship. After no success applying for various jobs, Louisa discovers Nancy Campbell's notice in the newspaper, seeking someone to look after her elderly Aunt Jane. Nancy's Aunt Jane is currently living in Rushen Camp, an alien detainment camp, on the Isle of Man. She is German and is a former opera singer who married a Scotsman many years ago. Now alone at eighty-two and recovering from a broken hip, Jane whose real name is Johanna von Arnim is coming to stay at Nancy's home, a pub, the Limehouse located next to the Royal Air Force base at Windyedge.

So Louisa accepts the position and travels to Liverpool and then by ferry to the Isle of Man. There she meets Johanna von Arnim, a feisty old lady who turns out to be a rule breaker like her mother. Wearing Frau von Arnim's furs, they travel back to Liverpool and using Frau's English name of Jane Warner get the train to Stonehaven where they wait for their ride to the Limehouse.

That someone is volunteer Ellen McEwen, a driver for the Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS) assigned to the RAF aerodrome in Windyedge. No one except Jamie Stuart knows that Ellen is a "Traveller" - a gypsy. Ellen billets at the Limehouse. Driving the Hillman Minx van, Ellen meets Louisa and Aunt Jane at the bus shelter on the Aberdeen road. She is surprised to see that Louisa is a black girl. As they approach the Limehouse, they see a plane approaching. Louisa is convinced the plane is German and it turns out she's correct.

After dropping off Louisa and Nancy at the Limehouse, Ellen races over to the RAF aerodrome. There Sergeant Norbert Ferguson, standing outside the guard's hut at the aerodrome tells her that a German has just landed on the airfield. Ellen sees that the aircraft is a Messerschmitt 109 fighter with its Luftwaffe markings covered up. In the operations building, standing just inside the radio room is the German pilot brandishing a black pistol. He quickly takes Ellen hostage while the radio operator explains that the pilot has a recognized code name of Odysseus and was expected by British Intelligence. The German pilot was to meet with Robert Ethan of the War Office. However that hasn't happened so he's to wait until the morning and if Ethan doesn't arrive, he's to leave.  Ellen drives the pilot to the Limehouse, where Louisa, Aunt Jane and Nancy Campbell are shocked to see her walk in with a German pilot.

Meanwhile Jamie and the Pimms Section of the 648 Squadron return to their base after intercepting transmissions between two Messerschmitt 109 fighters and then encountering one who leaves. Back at the base, Jamie learns  that they encountered a German plane that Intelligence was expecting. But Jamie believes that the Luftwaffe plane they'd run into was hunting for the traitor Intelligence was expecting. He also learns that the 648 Squadron will be sent back to the RAF aerodrome at Windyedge.

At the Limehouse, tension is high with the presence of the German pilot whose name they learn, is Felix Baer. He plays Mendelssohn's The Hebrides Overture which Louisa recognizes. When Louisa stands next to him, he knocks open the wooden box which he'd placed on the piano and she sees it contains a strange typewriter-like device labelled ENIGMA. Aunt Jane who speaks German, explains how Louisa's parents have been killed in the war. Eventually German pilot asks to take Jane's gramophone upstairs to this room, playing her records well into the night.

The next morning the German pilot leaves, having missed his British contact who arrives late. But before doing so, he places a coin into a crack in the black oak beam that formed part of the fireplace and are part of the wishing tree. After searching the Limehouse, Ethan leaves disappointed. However, later that morning Louisa makes an amazing discovery. First the coin that Felix Baer placed in the wishing tree is no coin but a small enamel disk that Louisa knows is from the typewriter- like instrument in Baer's wooden box. Then while in Room Four where Baer spent the night, Louisa discovers that the gas fireplace has been tampered with. When she removes the fireplace panels, she discovers that Baer has left the wooden box with a cipher machine named Enigma. This machine, as Aunt Jane explains, is able to create and translate code. Louisa is also able to find leaflets Baer hid, that provide instructions and dial settings for the next three months. Not knowing who to tell, they first hide the cipher machine and then eventually pass the information on to Jaime Beaufort-Stuart.

The Enigma offers the British pilots a fighting chance against the Germans but it also places the RAF Windyedge and the Limehouse at great risk when the Germans suspect they have one of their cipher machines. This sets up up a game of cat and mouse that might have deadly consequences.

Discussion

The Enigma Game is an exciting and well-written novel. Elizabeth Wein is a master storyteller, who captures her readers' attention almost immediately with a heart-pounding air battle over the North Sea between the RAF and the Luftwaffe. Wein employs three characters to narrate her story, beginning with Flight Lieutenant James G. Beaufort-Stuart who is the son of a Scottish laird. Picking up the story is fifteen-year-old Louisa Adair who is British-Jamaican, and Ellen McEwen who is a "traveller" the name given to Scottish Romani or gypsies. 

The strength of this novel is its engaging story line and the realistic and believable characters created by Wein. Set in 1940-early 1941 Scotland as the Battle of Britain is waning, The Enigma Game centers on the cipher machine, known as Enigma which has been stolen by a member of the German resistance and brought to Scotland. Its discovery by a young English girl results in the Enigma being used to help the bomber squadron assigned to the local RAF aerodrome get the upper hand on the Germans.

The role of the Enigma machine in helping the Allies during World War II has long been recognized. Developed by Arthur Scherbius, a German engineer at the end of World War I, the Enigma was used by Nazi Germany to send coded messages during World War II. However, in the 1930's, Polish mathematicians and code breakers were able to solve the mystery of Enigma and learn how to decode messages. In 1933, the Polish were able to build a replica Enigma machine based on intelligence the French secured. In 1939, lacking the resources to continue their work on modified Engima machines, the Polish began working with the British Intelligence. With war on the horizon, the Polish scientists were secreted out of Poland along with their Engima machines in 1939. The Germans continued to believe Enigma was secure and used it to send many messages.

The British did not obtain an Enigma machine until 1941 so the events in The Enigma Game are a bit out of the real timeline. Nevertheless, centering the story around Engima, offered Wein the opportunity to build a truly engaging main plot through the narratives of the three main characters. Perhaps the most poignant and heart-rending is that of Jamie Beaufort-Stuart and his 648 bomber squadron. Wein very much captures the danger, the sacrifice and the courage of the pilots as they fly missions against  the better equipped German airforce. These qualities are demonstrated by each of the pilots in Jamie's Pimms section when they are sent to bomb Stavanger, a Norwegian aerodrome being built by the Germans. The resulting catastrophe vividly portrays the very real risks these brave, young men encountered. As Wein shows, many airmen did not survive very long under such terrible battle conditions. 

The novel also highlights the effects of war, not just on those engaged in battle but on the civilian population as well, through the character of Louisa who is orphaned when both her parents are killed within days of each other, and through the food shortages that are experienced by those living in Scotland.

One character central to the main plot, Felix Baer, a German pilot who is a member of the German resistance, is based on the real-life defection of a three-man crew flying a German bomber, a Junkers 88 from Denmark to Aberdeen, Scotland in 1943. The crew did not bring an Enigma machine with them, but Wein used this as the basis for Baer's actions in the novel.  

The diverse cast of characters allows Wein to highlight some of the racial and ethnic issues that existed at this time in Britain and in America. Louisa is of mixed Jamaican and British heritage and she encounters racial prejudice throughout the novel because of her darker skin colour. When she arrives at the Limehouse, Nancy Campbell is shocked to see that she is black and stares at her. Louisa offers to leave but Jane Warner refuses to allow this. The guard on the base is more concerned with Louisa than he is with the German soldier, and Intelligence officer, Robert Ethan makes a racially discriminatory remark to Louisa telling her, "Well, perhaps the hoo-doo will help you to feel at home, Louisa." in reference to the coins in the wishing tree above the pub. When Louisa and Jane Warner take the bus into Stonehaven to visit the library, Louisa experiences more discrimination. While on the bus, a young boy believes Louisa is a German and therefore the enemy simply because of her dark skin. Filled with anger, Louisa thinks, "I thought about the little boy on the bus, who'd taken one look at me and decided I must be the enemy, just because he'd never seen anyone who looked like me before."

Ellen McEwen is a "traveller" or a gypsy. Her family are known to Jamie Beaufort-Stuart whom she considers an "old friend" because her mother and father camped on his grandfather's land. Ellen is careful to keep her heritage hidden as she knows this will be a source of trouble. She is careful not to use "traveller" words or do things that are considered common to gypsies and thus reveal who she really is. Ellen is careful around Nan and everyone she meets. "I lived in fear Nan would twig what I was and we'd have a bitter fight over whether I should leaver her house. I didn't think she'd prefer me to raise a tent in her garden, but I wasn't ready to find out."  

Although Ellen is able to hide what makes her different, Louisa is not. When Chip Wingate, a Texan, refers to Louisa as a "little darkie", Ellen at first hears this as "filthy tinker", and understand exactly how this makes Louisa feel. However, she doesn't nothing to defend her new friend, leaving that to Jamie and his friend Silver. When a brawl is instigated in the Limehouse after some racial slurs, Ellen stands up an reveals that she is a traveller. Later Ellen explains to Louisa that being called a tinker is the equivalent of Louisa being called a darkie. These experiences, along with many others strengthen the bond of friendship between the two girls.

The Enigma Game is such a well written novel, with an engaging cover that certainly encourages readers to crack the spine. But readers would have benefited from a map of England, Scotland and Norway as well a Cast of Characters located at the front of the novel. A glossary at the back containing some of the unusual words and slang used throughout the story might also be helpful for younger readers. Wein does include a detailed note about her writing of the novel at the back in a section titled, Author's Declaration of Accountability and offers an excellent section on Further Readings.

The Enigma Game is yet another excellent addition to Elizabeth Wein's group of World War II novels, this time taking a minor character, Jamie Beaufort-Stuart from Code Name Verity and telling his story. Highly recommended!

Book Details:

The Enigma Game by Elizabeth Wein
New York: Hyperion     2020
437 pp.

Red Bird Sings: The Story of Zitkala-Sa, Native American Author, Musician and Activist by Gina Capaldi & Q.L. Pearce

Red Bird is a unique picture book about the life of Zitkala-Sa, a member of the Yankton Sioux nation. Zitkala-Sa was also known as Gertrude Simmons. Red Bird picks up her story in 1883 with Zitkala-Sa living with her family near the Missouri River. She would often sit with four or five friends exchanging necklaces, beaded belts and sometimes even their moccasins. 

In February of 1884 when Zitkala-Sa was eight years old, she begged her parents to be allowed to go with the missionaries to the Land of the Red Apples in the East. Zitkala-Sa's older brother, Dawee had returned from three years of school. Finally her mother agreed. Zitkala-Sa travelled east on a train with three young braves, two tall girls and two other small girls like herself, Judewin and Thowin. They travelled 700 miles to White's Manual Labor Institute in Wabash, Indiana.

At the school, Zitkala-Sa began to cry and was homesick. At school she soon followed the daily routine of waking at six-thirty in the morning, washing, dressing and racing downstairs to roll call. Morning prayers and breakfast were followed by their daily training. Girls were taught how to sew and do housework, while the boys were taught how to care for livestock and farm. After training, they learned how to read and write and how to speak well in public. Zitkala-Sa's heart soared on Saturdays when she had piano and violin lessons.

The White's Institute was run by Quakers who also taught Zitkala-Sa and the other children about equal rights for women and about slavery and instilled in them to be tolerant of others and to work for equality. 

In February of 1887, Zitkala-Sa returned home but found things much changed. Her mother lived in a log home now instead of a tipi. Her brother Dawee like many of the other young men, wore whiteman's trousers and spoke English. Zitkala-Sa felt caught between two worlds, that of her people and the Anglos'. In February 1891, at the age of fifteen, Zitkala-Sa decided to return to the Anglo world, to the White's Institute run by the Quakers. There as a good student, she earned her first diploma in 1895. Zitkala-Sa was such an accomplished musician on violin and piano that she had taken over the music teacher's position when she resigned.

After graduating, Zitkala-Sa did not return home as her mother wished but instead remained in Indiana where she gave music lessons to the Anglo children in the summer. In September 1895, she began her studies at Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana, financed by the Quakers. It was a time of loneliness and worry for Zitkala-Sa.

She won an oratorical contest at Earlham and went on to win one of two prizes offered at the State contest with her speech about the mistreatment of the Indian people. Sadly, Zitkala-Sa never earned her degree from Earlham as she became very ill and had to leave school. 

But Zitkala-Sa remained undaunted. She taught at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania. In 1900 her stories about her people and her culture began appearing in the Atlantic Monthly to great interest. In 1900, Zitkala-Sa's journey back home revealed the shocking truth of the broken promises of the Anglo's who had now taken over the land given to her people.

At first Zitkala-Sa believed the way to help her people was to continue to grow her talents as a musician and so she began studying music and voice at the New England Conservatory of Music. But she returned home to help her family and her elderly mother. Instead she spent many years informing the Anglo's about her people's culture through her writing, music and an opera she wrote. She also began to advocate for the right of Native Americans to vote and become American citizens.

Discussion

Authors Gina Capaldi and Q.L. Pearce adapted three serialized stories Zitkala-Sa wrote at the turn of the twentieth century to tell her story to younger readers. They also indicate in their Author's Note at the front of the book, that they "...have woven additional primary and secondary sources into the text..." reworking the language she used to make it more understandable for today's reader. 

Zitkala-Sa 1898

Zitkala-Sa was a remarkable woman, able to channel her anger and frustration over the treatment of her own people and Native Americans into activism that made a difference. Zitkala-Sa had experienced the misguided attempts of the Quakers to eradicate her own identity and practice of her culture and replace it with the Anglo-European culture. She strove to maintain her Native American identity while using her considerable talents to advocate for indigenous Americans. Zitkala-Sa not only worked to obtain better health care, education, and job opportunities for her people, but also to confront the reneging on land claims and to obtain voting and citizen rights for Native Americans. But Zitkala-Sa not only worked on behalf of her people but for all Americans, by educating them about her culture through her writings and her music. Zitkala-Sa performed before a U.S. President and wrote the opera, Sun Dance, the first opera written by a Native American.

Capaldi and Pearce have written an engaging picture book that is sensitive to the plight of indigenous North Americans while also showcasing Zitkala-Sa's remarkable talents and as well as her determination, resiliency and courage. One example of Zitkala-Sa's determination and courage is her speech at the State oratorical contest, given while a derogatory sign was held up in the audience. Undaunted, she gave the speech and won a prize. Zitkala-Sa's story is enhanced by the expressive illustrations of author, Capaldi. Red Bird is a picture book that can serve as an introduction to this remarkable Native American activist, as well as to the issues that involve the indigenous peoples of North America.

Red Bird contains extra material for those interested in learning more about Zitkala-Sa. There is detailed Afterword, a Selected Bibliography, a Partial List of Zitkala-Sa's Writings as well as a list of books in the Further Reading section.

Book Details:

Red Bird Sings: The Story of Zitkala-Sa, Native American Author, Musician and Activist by Gina Capaldi & Q.L. Pearce
Minneapolis: Carolrhoda Books     2011

The Library Bus by Bahram Rahman

Pari will be accompanying her mama as she drives the library bus. This bus is filled with shelves of books and today is Pari's first time helping. They leave Kabul before sunrise, arriving at a small village in a valley hidden by mountains just as dawn comes. Once the bus parks, Pari opens the back door and welcomes a group of girls into the bus. After they have returned their library books and chosen new ones, Pari's mama helps them learn the English alphabet.

Soon they are off to another destination, this time a refugee camp beyond the mountains. On the way Mama tells Pari that her Grandpa taught her to read. Girls were not allowed to attend school when she was a young girl, so they had to learn to read and write in secret. But Pari will be able to attend school next year.

They arrive at the dusty refugee camp at noon. Pari's mama hands out pencils and notebooks to those who need new ones. Once again she leads the girls in learning the English alphabet. At home that night, Pari wonders why the girls in the village or camp don't attend school. Her mother explains that the library bus is the only schooling they have. She reminds Pari that her situation will be different next year as she will be attending school.

Discussion

Bahram Rahman was born in Kabul, Afghanistan and grew up during the civil war and the Taliban regime. After earning a medical degree and a graduate degree in public policy, Rahman was able to emigrate to Canada in 2012. He had been active in Afghanistan, working to try to improve the rights of girls and women in the country. Girls like his own sister were not able to attend school.

The Library Bus was inspired by the real first library bus to operate in Kabul, Afghanistan run by Charmaghz, a Kabul-based non-profit. Founded by Freshta Karim, a young Afghani woman, Charmaghz works to encourage critical thinking in children so they can grow up to be "positive and open-minded individuals". As a result of the repressive policies of the Taliban, Afghanistan has a very low literacy rate. It is estimated that over three million girls in Afghanistan have never been to school.

Like the bus in this picture book, the Charmaghz Mobile Library bus which is rented from the Ministry of Transport, leaves early in the morning and travels to two or three locations each day. Care is taken to park the bus in an area that will be safe from bombs or terrorist attacks. The mobile library stays at each location for about two hours. In that time children are free to look for books in the mobile library and for those who cannot read, there is a storytime at the back of the bus on the carpeted floor. This is a much needed service for the many children who have no access to books.

The Library Bus tells about the mobile library bus using Rahman's simple text accompanied by the delightful, expressive illustrations done by artist Gabrielle Grimard. The illustrations rendered in watercolour and digital media, capture the delight and wonder of the children as they greet the bus and search for books. 

To learn more about Charmaghaz, check out their website.

Book Details:

The Library Bus by Bahram Rahman
Toronto: Pajama Press  2020