Across So Many Seas by Ruth Behar

Across So Many Seas tells the stories of four young girls of Jewish ancestry in four very different eras.

The story begins in Toledo, Spain in the year 1492. Benvenida Toledano lives in Toledo with her parents and her brothers, Isaac and Jacob. It is a bright sunny March 31st morning, as Benvenida and her family listen to the officer-at-arm as he reads the proclamation from the King and Queen of Spain. It states that all Jews must leave the Spanish kingdom by the end of the month of July or they will be executed. They will only be allowed to stay if they convert to Catholicism. King Ferdinando and Queen Isabella want to unite the kingdom under the Catholic faith, Many Jews have already converted, including Benvenida's father's two sisters, her aunts Leah and Rachel and their families. As well, Benvenida's two best friends, Susanah and Deborah have also converted and no longer play with her.

Benvenida is able to read and write in Hebrew and Spanish and knows some Arabic. Although women aren't allowed to read, her father allows this because Benvenida's mother's family are printers. Her father's sisters, now known as Asuncion and Juana press him to convert as they did, so his family can remain in Spain. But her father, who is a hazan, flatly refuses. And so her father begins selling their possessions while her mother writes letters to her family in Naples, telling them they are coming. Benvenida's mother's family moved to Naples after her birth years ago.

Eventually, after delaying in the hopes the decree would be relaxed, Benvenida's family leaves their home taking the key to their house. Her father is also determined to carry the Torah on his shoulder, wrapped in Benvenida's shawl. Along with the remaining Jews of Toledo, they walk through villages and plains in the hot sun. One of the women, Naomi gives birth beside the road to a baby girl named Preciada. On one occasion they are met by priests offering them to convert to Catholicism and some elders do so. 

In Siete Aguas, they are aided by an innkeeper, a converso who helps them obtain passage on a ship, in a closed cabin, travelling to Naples. On the voyage, Benvenida's father dies and is buried at sea. In Naples, they are reunited with Benvenida's mother's family including her mother's sister, Tia Mazal and brother, Tio Yehuda. Tio Yehuda reveals that the situation in Naples is not ideal either There is famine and cholera and the Jews are being blamed for these problems. They are planning to leave for Constantinople soon because the Muslims there do not try to convert the Jews. The day to leave soon arrives and Benvenida and her family arrive in the city to start over.

The story now moves four hundred years into the future in the newly independent country of Turkey under President Ataturk. It is 1923 and Reina, a descendant of Benvenida lives with Mima and Papa and her sisters, eight-year-old Dina and ten-year-old Suzi in Silivri. Their neighbours with whom they share a courtyard are a Muslim family: Ahmet and his wife Afrah and their three sons Sadik, Emir and Nazim.

Twelve-year-old Sadik is friends with Reina and invites her to watch the all night fireworks at a party at the port. Reina wants to go but her father forbids it. However, Reina is determined to make her own choice and when everyone is asleep, she sneaks out of their house. With Sadik, Reina goes to the beach However, she quickly realizes she is the only girl among the Armenian, Greek and Muslim boys. The lone Jewish boy, Benny asks her to play her oud and sing a song for them which Reina does. But this ends up leading to an altercation in which her oud is scratched by Benny. 

The next evening after dinner Reina's father reveals  that he has learned she was at the beach the night before with Sadik. Furious that she disobeyed him and that she has shamed their family he tells her "You are not my daughter anymore. To me you are dead."  Several weeks later Mima tells Reina that her father is sending her to Cuba with his sister, Tia Zimbul, where she will marry a distant cousin named Moshico. Reina's journey to Cuba will open a new chapter in her life that leads to more journeys for her daughter and her granddaughter and a wonderful discovery that despite what happened so long ago, a friend never forgot her.

Discussion

Across So Many Seas is a historical fiction novel that weaves an engaging ancestral story portraying one Jewish family through the centuries. The story features the daughters who carry on the traditions of the Sephardic Jews as they move through time and location.

The author, Ruth Behar, decided to focus on young girls, "...since the voices of young girls are too often missing in the records of the past."  Behar's paternal and maternal grandmothers both arrived in Cuba in the 1920's, one bringing "...the Yiddish language and the Ashkenazi culture of Eastern Europe..." and the other "...the language of Ladino, or Judeo-Spanish, and the culture of the Sephardic Jews, who trace their ancestry to Spain before the 1942 expulsion."  Her abuela's life, as a Turkish Jew who was sent to Havana to be married, provided the inspiration for this story. Like Reina, she played the oud beautifully as a young woman.

The novel moves seamlessly from the events in the late fifteenth century to the early twentieth century in 1923. Behar decided to skip these four hundred years as those who have Sephardic heritage are often unable to trace their lineage that far back. They do know that their families originated in Spain so that seemed to be a logical way to structure her story. The novel also incorporates important historical events that form the background to each character's story. In the Sources section at the back of the novel, Behar offers short explanations regarding both the important historical events and the Jewish customs incorporated into the story. 

Using these important historical events as the backdrop to the lives of these young women allows readers to learn about events that affected millions of people over the last four hundred years. For example, the Spanish Inquisition which was formalized by Pope Sixtus IV led to the Edict of Expulsion. For centuries prior, Jews and Catholics had lived together in Spain.  There were conversions over the centuries from Islam and Judaism to Catholicism. These people were called conversos. It's likely many of the initial conversions were not genuine, either being forced or motivated by other desires such as ambition, as only Catholics could hold public office in Spain.  But it is likely that later generations of the initial conversos were faithful Catholics. 

The Reconquista of the Iberian peninsula (from the Moors) led to strong anti-converso and anti-Semitic feelings. During this time Spain was forging a new national identity - one that was strongly Catholic in light of finally reclaiming Spain from the Moors.  The Spanish Inquisition came to Spain to deal with those conversos who had done so under false pretenses, It had no authority on practicing Muslims and Jews. It was in this nationalistic environment that led the Spanish crown to request Jews either convert or leave. Many chose to convert but many also chose to leave as Benvenida's family did. 

In this regard, Behar's account of what happened, from the Jewish perspective does ignore history from the Spanish Catholic perspective and judges it without regard to the Spanish experience. While touring the Sephardic Museum, their guide Mari Luz, points out a large facsimile of the Edict of Expulsion hanging on the wall stating, "You can see the signatures of King Ferdinando and Queen Isabel, and the date, March 31, 1492. It's here so we won't forget the horror they unleashed with their words of intolerance and hate."  The Spanish Crown gave the Jewish people time to convert or leave before the penalty applied. Was it cruel and harsh by today's standards? Absolutely. But it was also the action of a king and queen attempting to finally bring lasting peace to their country which had been at war for over seven hundred years. As a result, Spain would avoid the religious wars that came to be a part of life in the rest of Europe.

All four major characters, Benvenida, Reina, Alegra and Paloma  are intelligent, resilient young women. Benvenida endures deadly prejudice that forces her family to flee both Spain and Italy. Reina experiences the loss of her family as a result of the social restrictions that still existed on girls and women in the early twentieth century. Alegra wants to help others learn to read but must flee her country because of the Communist regime. 

Behar brings the story almost full circle with Alegra's daughter, Paloma, "the keeper of memories" and the three generations of women returning to their roots in Toledo, Spain. There, they encounter the parchment Benvenida placed so long ago in the wall of her home prior to leaving for Naples. It was her hope that someday it would be found and it was. Although Reina, Alegra and Paloma do not realize that this is their ancestor they are inspired to claim the writer as one.

Reina also learns that the boy who was her best friend, Sadik Topal, was their guide's father-in-law. Mari Luz reveals that her father-in-law Sadik learned to play the oud and never forgot Reina.  Sadly the two friends missed being reunited by a year, with Sadik's death a year earlier. This lovely connection brings the story full circle and helps Reina to heal from losing a friend so long ago.

Across So Many Seas is a touching and well-written novel that ties in several important historical events through the lives of several generations of Jewish girls.

Book Details:

Across So Many Seas by Ruth Behar

New York: Nancy Paulsen Books     2025
258 pp.

Leila and the Blue Fox by Kiran Millwood Hargrave

Twelve-year-old Leila Saleh is on her way to meeting up with her mother, Amani Saleh, a meteorologist and researcher in Norway. 

Leila has been living with her aunt and her cousin, seventeen-year-old Mona in her aunt's terraced home in Croydon, England for the past six years. All of them fled out of Damascus, Syria when Leila was just five-years-old.

At the airport in Tromso, Norway, her flight guardian guides Leila through immigration. But Leila's mom isn't there to meet her. Instead it is her mom's friend, Liv Nilsen. They are quickly joined by Liv's daughter Britt, who has just arrived from her school in Bergen. The drive to her mother's apartment is filled with surprises for Leila: the huge mountain and the tunnel under the sea, the Arctic Cathedral. In the apartment Liv shares with Leila's mother, she shows Leila a picture of a fox they have named Miso and have been following. Liv tells Leila that her mother couldn't meet her at the airport because she had a meeting regarding funding for studying this animal. 

Later that evening, Leila meets her mother in a restaurant along with Liv and Britt. In the restaurant, Leila's mother reveals that their funding to study the Arctic fox they've been following and recently put a tracking collar on, has been approved. Liv tells the group that the fox, who they've named Miso, was born in a litter on a beach in Svalbard and "has been walking for weeks now, across the sea ice, miles at a time, going north and then west." She has walked almost a thousand miles in one month. Liv states "She's proving animals can adapt through migration even in these most extreme times." The new funding will allow Liv and Amani to track Miso by boat, "...observing her interactions with other animals, seeing whether her coat changes color or her eating habits change." Then in a stunning turn of events, Leila's mother asks if Leila and Britt want to accompany them on the boat! The two girls agree, leading the four to have a remarkable journey of discovery and healing.

Discussion

Leila and the Blue Fox is a story that focuses on the strained relationship between a young girl and her mother, set against the backdrop of research in the high Arctic. The novel incorporates two narratives: that of Leila and her mother, and that of a blue fox, Miso as she journeys across the Arctic ice towards food and finding a mate.

Leila Saleh and her mother Amani's backstory is gradually revealed in the novel: Leila was born in Damascus and they fled the war in Syria when she was only five years old. Her father remained behind in Syria but Leila, her mother, her aunt and her cousin Mona all left. Even though it was seven years ago, Leila remembers the experience. "She remembers it all. The night they left Damascus, bombs lighting the sky like fireworks. Basbousa, terrified in his basket, handed to their neighbor who would not leave. The car into the hills, a truck to the border. The smell of gasoline, the sound of crying, energy bars like sawdust in her throat. Amma chanting....Walking awake, walking half-asleep, being carried, walking always in the dark. More cars, more trucks, a van where Mona had a panic attack...The boat...the boat." 

Leila, her mother along with Amma and Mona settled in Croydon in south London. However, Leila's mother, a meteorologist who studies climate change, was unable to find work in England and so she moved to Noway. There she got a job at the Tromso Arctic Institute. The result was that Leila has not seen her mom in six years. This long absence has created feelings of abandonment and intense anger in Leila who wonders why her mother left her. The long absence seems somewhat contrived: was Amani not able to find even a week to return to London to visit her daughter? Leila believes it is because Norway is "as far away from home as she can be. Because everything is different, from the food to the clothes to the weather, because she doesn't want to remember home. And really, though no one says it, because she doesn't want to remember Leila."

Leila's anger and sense of abandonment are intensified when she arrives in Tromso, Norway only to learn that her mother is not at the airport to meet her but instead has chosen to attend a meeting for research funding. When Leila meets her mother at the restaurant she refuses her touch and is angered by her mother's use of her childhood name of "La-La". Six years have passed and no one calles Leila that pet name anymore. To Leila, her mother's "...work was clearly more important to her than being a mom." Later on Leila states that her mother "...was following the fox anywhere ti led, when she hadn't even come to find Leila, even though she knew exactly where she was." 

A chance for healing of the rift between mother and daughter happens when Amani and Liv invite their daughters to accompany them on a boat trip as they track the blue fox Miso's journey westward across the ice. The journey towards healing between Amma and Leila is mirrored in Miso's struggle to find a safe place to live.

While on the boat tracking Miso, Leila continues to struggle with her feelings regarding her mother, both hating and loving her. In London, she was able to hide her hurt, keeping busy with life. "But now Leila is here with her, feeling her warmth and hearing her laugh, the absence feels sharper, ragged. Being with her has made all that time without her far more painful." 

In close quarters on the boat, Leila finds herself drawn into her mother's research and even understanding her mother's love of the Arctic. She becomes the research team's social media manager, posting information about Miso's journey on Twitter. Becoming involved helps Leila begin to understand her mother. But being on the boat with her mother, experiencing her also bring back memories of a life lost - in Damascus. "With them arrive feelings so big she can't fit them all inside her head: sadness and happiness and the feeling Britt described, of a lost life, a half life it is easier to forget."

Both Liv's daughter Britt and Leila struggle to cope with mothers who appear to be self-absorbed and disconnected from their daughters. Britt tells Leila that her mother never asks questions about her boarding school and doesn't know about her friends, the books or music she likes. Britt tells Leila her mother "...knows the names of every whale but nothing about me." Leila can relate to Britt's pain because of her own mother's focus on Miso and her research and the fact that she won't tell Amma and Mona about the research and about being on the boat.

When a crisis sees Leila's mother arrested by the Canadian Coast Guard and Leila must tell Amma and Mona what has been happening, "She realizes she loves Mum, but she loves Mona and Amma as well. That they are more than enough." And Leila tells Mona she plans to return to London. Eventually when Amina returns she finally reaches out to Leila explaining why she left England and never returned. Amina reveals that she didn't fit in and didn't feel safe. She decided to stay in Norway because it allowed her to support Leila and her aunt and cousin. "I didn't leave because of you...I left for you. To provide for you, as well as for myself..." 

This helps Leila understand what has happened and why, and helps her to come to terms with her feelings of loss and abandonment. But it also doesn't explain why Amani did not return at least for holiday visits therefore seems shallow and incomplete. Nor does Leila question why her mother never returned for at least a holiday visit. However, she does ask her mother to visit "even once a year" which she agrees to do.

The author does tie together Leila's family's "migration" with that of Miso's. Leila's mother tells her,  "We had to leave our home, because of war. But what if it was because of water, or lack of it? Or the weather? Patterns are changing. Miso's journey proves that migration is necessary for survival. What Miso did, what we did, was leave home to find something better."  The message for young readers is that refugees often do not want to leave their homes, but come because they must, because they are seeking a safer, better life.

Miso's journey across the Arctic ice from Svalbard a group of islands in the Barents Sea is based on the real life journey of a female Arctic fox named Anna who travelled from 3,500 km from Norway's Svalbard archipelgo to Ellesmere Island in Canada. Anna began her journey on March 26, 2018 and arrived arrived in Canada on July 1. The arctic blue fox had  been fitted with a radio collar in 2017 and was tracked by researchers at the Norwegian Polar Institute. The fox travelled via sea ice and across glaciers. Her journey demonstrated how important sea ice is to animals in the Arctic.  Although Miso's narrative is short, there are lovely illustrations by Tom de Fresten.

This novel was well written and will definitely appeal to middle grade readers interested in animals and the High Arctic as well as young refugees seeking a better life.

Book Details:

Leila and the Blue Fox by Kiran Millwood Hargrave
New York: Union Square Kids      2022
243 pp. 

Zarina Divided by Reem Faruqi

Zarina Divided is a story told in free verse about one family's experience during the Partition in 1947.

Zarina's family are Muslim and her mother, a petite woman, is expecting another baby. Eleven-year-old Zarina lives in Poona, India with her father Abajan, her mother, and her three brothers, Wahab (15), Qadir (13), and Adil (7). Their home  was once Zarina'a great-great-grandfather's.  It is a bungalow with twelve rooms and a wrap-around verandah, as well as a walled garden. Beyond the garden walls are sellers of chai, samosa, sabzi (vegetables) and bananas. Zarina's family have servants: a mali (gardener) named Irfan, a chawkidar (watchman) named Mahesh, Khushboo who is their ayah (nanny) and Basheer who is their khansama (cook). 

Zarina's father and her uncles are always listening to the radio, leaving her wondering what is going on. She hears the names of Quaid-e-Azam, Gandhi-ji, Nehru, and Jinnah Zindabad. Zarina knows there is talk of splitting the land into two countries, Pakistan in the west for Muslims and India in the east for Hindus. Zarina's father is obsessed with the idea of Pakistan, a country just for Muslims and is working for the Muslim League. His friend is Quaid-e-Azam whose real name is Muhammad Ali Jinnah and the force behind the partition.

At school, Zarina and her friends wonder who is leaving and who is staying. But their teacher, Mrs. Nizami

Zarina's aunt, her father's younger sister whom he calls Pyari Jan which means "Loved One", is married in their garden. Abajan invites not only their famiily's hired help, Khushboo, irfan, Basheer and Makesh, but also Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah and his sister, Fatima Jinnah. Zarina is not happy about this and does offer these two special guests the sherbet as her mother asks. Zarina realizes that if Pakistan is created they will lose their home in Poona. 

As independence from Britain moves closer to reality, and the formation of Pakistan and India also appears to be happening, Mrs. Nizami reminds her students that they are all human regardless of their faith. She gives each student a brand new pencil, something that thrills Zarina.

Zarina is furious when her best friend, Jahana reveals that her family is leaving soon for Pakistan. She tells Zarina that if she stays in Poon, like their friend Geeta, she is Hindu. The next afternoon Jahana comes by to say goodbye as her family is leaving that night.

Things begin to change in Zarina's neighborhood: the normally noisy roads are now quiet with the sellers no longer yelling about goods for sale. Khushboo teaches Zarina how to wash their clothes, how to iron Abajan's handkerchiefs, the kurtas and shalwars, and how to sweep the floor with the jharoo. Geeta is no longer allowed to come visit because she is Hindu and Zarina is Muslim and when she sees Zarina, she throws stones at her. 

In Poona there are riots with people being hurt and dying. Zarina and her brothers are no longer allowed to attend school. Her father decides that they will leave in two weeks for Pakistan, a decision that greatly upsets Zarina, especially when she learns that Khushboo will not be going with them. Khushboo explains to Zarina that she cannot come because she is Hindu and she has to stay with her family who are in Poona.

But when a mob arrives at Zarina's home looking for Muslims to kill, Zarina's father decides the must leave that night. It will be a treacherous, chaotic trip that leads to many changes for Zarina and her family.

Discussion

Although Zarina Divided is a work of historical fiction, it is loosely based on the experiences of the author's maternal grandmother, Zarina. As with the Zarina in the novel, Reem Faruqi's grandmother lived in Poona, India in a house with a large garden. Zarina's father (the author's great-grandfather Ahmed E. H. Jaffer) was a politician, elected to the Central Legislative Assembly in 1934. He was a member of the All India Muslim League that came to press for a separate Muslim country, Pakistan. 

As with the character in the novel, Zarina left India for the new country of Pakistan via a ship, the Shirala. And she did attend boarding school, St. Denys, but only after everyone in the family gave their approval by signing the petition her father drew up. The lone exception was her mother (the author's great-grandmother). And like Zarina in the novel, she thrived at the boarding school.

Zarina Divided manages to portray some of the reality of the Partition of India in 1947 from a Muslim point of view. Zarina's family are Muslim and when the Partition happens they are caught in India, now a country for Hindus only. This means they must travel to what was once western India, to the new state called Pakistan. Likewise, those Hindus living in Pakistan must leave their homes and move east into India. This mass migration according to the Author's Note at the back, "was one of the bloodiest upheavals in human history and was the largest mass migration of the twentieth century. Over the course of a year, an estimated fifteen million people crossed borders that were drawn up in a rush by the British Empire."

The mass migration was rife with violence and bloodshed, nd Zarina's family experienced some of that. Their trip out of Poona, India to Karachi, Pakistan is harrowing for Zarina and her family from the very beginning. The train station is chaotic, the trains packed both within and on top with people. They lose the youngest boy, Adil but Abajan is able to find him and bring him back to the train. Zarina's family barely escape being murdered on the train when a mob looking for Muslims board the train. They are hidden in a bathroom by the station manager. The trip on the Shirala is also challenging but in a different way: sea sickness, and crowded conditions with distressed children and women. 

While the author indicates that there was much killing and violence, she also highlights acts of mercy by Hindus and Muslims. For example, when a Hindu mob comes to their home in Poona, looking to kill Zarina's family, Mahesh, their Hindu watchman saves them by hiding them in the bathroom and telling the mob the family has moved. Adil who became separated from the family at the train station is also saved in what could have been a devastating situation. Abajan tells the family upon his return with Adil, 

"I saw him crying, he says.

A Hindu woman was holding him up,

asking people who he belonged to.

If it wasn't for her,

we wouldn't have found him..."

In Karachi, it is Zarina's family's turn to protect someone from harm. The house they have been allotted belongs to Rupi, a Sikh woman who is not happy with this arrangement. However, when a Muslim mob arrives, Zarina's parents hide the lady in the bathroom and turn away the mob. Rupi is grateful but nevertheless decides to leave her home. Abajan gives her the address of their old house in Poona, recognizing the injustice that's been done to her and hoping in some small way to address that.

Zarina and her family seem more fortunate than many people were during the partition. Zarina is eventually sent to a private school. This request is not without intense inner conflict for Zarina, She is Zarina divided: she desires to be a good daughter but she also wants a good education. All her family members sign the petition to allow her to attend a private school, except Zarina's mother. This creates tension between mother and daughter. Zarina feels that she has hurt her mother by leaving for school. However, both her older brother Wahab and Khushboo explain that she has done nothing wrong but that her mother is not well. Eventually Zarina and her mother reconcile with her mother telling Zarina how proud she is of her determination to learn and get an education. 

Life at the private school, St. Denys, also provides challenges for Zarina and opportunities for personal growth too. The school has a small group of students made up of Muslims and those British who have stayed behind after the Partition. Zarina befriends a British girl, Daphne Drinkwater. However one of the Muslim students, Sidra, is openly prejudiced towards the British girls. She tells Zarina that she needs to "stick to your kind of people", that is people who are brown or Muslim. Sidra talks only to the classmates who are like her, while treating the white students as though they are enemies. Finally, Zarina confronts Sidra,

"You're not better than anyone else.

You need to give people a chance

whether they look like you

or not,

whether they act like you

or not.

We are all the same kind of people,

HUMAN"

Although Zarina's words are harsh, she is happy that she didn't physically push Sidra as she might have done when she lived in Poona. Zarina remembers her bad temper and is trying to overcome it. So when she sees the sadness in Sidra, walking alone a few days later, Zarina wants to be kind. She loops Sidra arm-in-arm with herself and Daphne and notices the small smile on Sidra's face. 

Zarina also begins to assert herself when it comes to the practice of her faith. She makes the decision to fast for Ramadan. When she and her Muslim friends decide to eat Sehri and are caught, Zarina explains to the matron why this is important to them and allowances are made.

The novel ends on a happy note, with Zarina returning home for the winter holidays, reuniting with her family but also her best friend, Jahana who is interested in the attending the private school. While the novel does offer some information on the effects of the partition of India into two countries it is also about a young girl's journey towards womanhood and independence. Zarina Divided does offer readers a map of Zarina's journey from Poona to Karachi to Muree.

Book Details:

Zarina Divided by Reem Faruqi
New York: Harper Collins Children's Books     2025

325 pp.

The Peacemaker by Joseph Bruchac

Okwaho and his best friend Tawis live in a small village called Kanata, which is nestled in the hills near Long Creek.  Their little community made up of only fourteen families, a total of fifty people, had left the big village of Onondaga five months earlier. The decision to leave had been the idea of the women who are the heads of the families. They were tired of constant war and waters to live in peace. The leader, the great war chief of Onondaga was Atatarho, also called the Entangled One, whose thoughts were only of making war.

Okwaho's father, Holds the Door Open, and Tawis's uncle, Burnt Hair told Atatarho of their decision to leave. He was angry but allowed them to leave. When their families left, no one came to wish them a safe journey. Except for a young woman, Clouds Forming, who Okwaho and Tawis's best friend. Although the three friends were inseparable, she belonged to Atatarho's Bear Clan and so her family had to stay.

On this warm autumn day, Okwaho and Tawis went to the small stream where they knew there were big trout. They were careful, listening and watching before approaching the open meadow near the stream. While they were watching the stream, they both saw a large brook trout, big enough to provide for both of their families.

To catch the fish, Okwaho slips into the stream and captures the trout with his hands. But while underwater, Okwaho hears the thud of feet on the bank and a shout. Hidden by the tree roots on the bank, Okwaho hears the voices of three men who have captured Tawis and are questioning him. Tawis tells them he is alone but they do not believe him. The warriors also tellTawis that they plan to attack his small village with a large war party and they will then capture his friend.

Okwaho's presence is revealed when a root snaps. Tawis yells for Okwaho to run and he flees with two of the men in pursuit. He quickly realizes that these men are Standing Stone (Oneida) warriors. This does not surprise him because a Standing Stone Village had been raided by Atatarho recently. Okwaho's community knew of it, although none had been involved. Warriors from Onondaga involved in the raid had visited his community and bragged about killing two Oneida warriors as well as the capture of women and boys.

Okwaho escapes and returns to Kanata. Waiting at the entrance into the village stockade were Tawis's uncle, Burnt Hair and Okwaho's father, Holds the Door Open, and his mother, Wolf Woman. Okwaho relates what happened and Wolf Woman sends four men in pursuit of the Oneida men and Tawis. Meanwhile, Okwaho tells Tawis's mother, Bird Flying what happened and how her son saved him from capture.

As the days pass, Okwaho struggles to cope with the loss of his best friend, and his growing anger. Although he tries to distract himself by keeping busy his thoughts are in turmoil. The arrival of a stranger, called Carries, brings a message and more importantly hope to Okwaho and his people.

Discussion

The Peacemaker is a vivid and engaging retelling of the story of the peacemaker that is so important to the culture of the People of the Longhouse. This novel was written by author Joseph Bruchac, who has claimed to be of Abenaki heritage. 

The novel tells the story of how peace came to five Indigenous nations, the Cayuga, the Oneida, the Onondaga, the Seneca and the Mohawk, who resided in the area around the Great Lakes. These five nations were always at war with one another, and there was not only much bloodshed, but torture and kidnapping of women and children. This constant state of war had a profound effect on the peoples of these nations and made the Creator sad. So he sent a man called the Peacemaker to unite these nations in peace. 

Born on the northern shores of Lake Ontario, the Peacemaker was raised by his mother and grandmother and received a message of peace from the Creator in a dream. He began to tell this message, travelling in what appeared to be a stone canoe, starting in the east with the Mohawks. The Mohawks were wary of his message of peace, and they tested him by forcing him over Cohoes Falls. He survived the test and they accepted his message. 

The Peacemaker, while telling the story of how the five nations came to form a peaceful alliance, also focuses on how the constant state of war affected the First Nations people. This is best shown through the young Onondaga narrator, Okwaho who loses his best friend, Tawis in a raid. With the loss of his friend, Okwaho finds himself dreaming of vengeance. Okwaho is a boy who loves to make songs and so he tries to put these thoughts from his head with songs. When he seeks answers from his mother Wolf Woman she tells him how this time of constant warring has come to be. "The minds of our leaders have become twisted. They no longer think first of giving thanks, first of peace. They no longer turn to the clan mothers for guidance. Instead, they think only of power, of making war and striking back at those who strike us. And the Entangled One, Atatarho, is the worst of all." Okwaho tells his mother that "The One Who Grasps the Sky" needs to send another messenger. 

As the days Okwaho finds himself growing angrier and angrier. "Anger at himself as well as at those who took his best friend from him. And as the anger grew, the fact of Atatarho came into his mind. A man so filled with anger that it twisted his body. Was that how he would eventually look?" Okwaho's struggles have not gone unnoticed by Burnt Hair who he feels that "...now Okwaho walks about as if a dark cloud has come to rest around him..."

Okwaho finds himself feeling that no where is safe anymore. He also finds that "...the anger twisting inside made him impatient." especially towards the younger children in his village. Okwaho feels he "..will never be happy again," 

However things begin to change for Okwaho and his people with the arrival of a stranger named Carries, who comes with an important message of peace. Carries tells the village about the arrival five months earlier of a man dressed in white buckskin in a white birchbark canoe to his village which is about a four day walk. The man told them that his name is Skennerahowi, the Peacemaker and that he has come from the creator with a message of peace. Carries explains that even though this man was Wendat they could understand him. Skennerahowi proceeded to tell the village the story of his birth.

When Okwaho hears this story,  he felt "...something deep inside himself, something other than anger. What was it? Hope. That was it. That was what he felt, for the first time in a long time, hope like a small bird just beginning to flutter its wings." Carries also explains how the people of the Flint Stone village near the River of Rapids came to accept Skennerahowi's message of peace. He tells them that his own Flint Stone people as well as the Great Stone People and the Swampy Land People have all come to accept the message of peace and that he will come to this village too.

However, the message of peace that Carries brings, does not diminish the loss that Okwaho feels. "Even if a new dawn of peace did come, it would be too late for those who had been killed or taken away as captives. His uncle, At the Edge of the Sky, would still be dead. His best friend would remain far away, being taught to forget his old life, his former friends, even his name."

Carries sympathizes with Okwaho, telling him that the loss of his twin brother in war led him to take revenge by killing. But revenge did not make him feel better nor resolve his pain. He continues to tell Okwaho more stories about the arrival and message of Skennerahowi. When Skennerahowi first meets Carries and his fellow warriors, Caller and Beaver Tails, he tells them, "First though, let me put out your fire. A fire that is left burning and not properly put out is like anger or revenge. It may end up destroying everything." He is telling Okwaho that the fire of revenge can destroy everything. He goes on to tell the story of the frog and shake, who locked in mortal combat, ate one another. Okwaho realizes the story is not just about the effects of war but also for him. "He had been holding on to the frog. If he did not let go, that anger would eat him. He would either be destroyed or become as twisted as Atatarho." He knows that he has to let go of his anger. "To no longer look back and regret the past, but to look forward." Okwaho wants to follow the Peacemaker's way. Eventually Okwaho learns from the Peacemaker that his friend Tawis is safe and this helps him to aid the Peacemaker in his mission.

The Peacemaker also portrays the power stories have in the lives of Indigenous peoples. Okwaho in particular is enthralled by Carries stories. They bring him hope, quell his anger, and serve as a way to teach about the Creator and the right way to live.

The Peacemaker is an appealing retelling of the formation of the Great League that is marred by the questionable claims of Abenaki heritage by the author. While this claim might be unsubstantiated, the novel is well written and does offer readers a valid version of the peacemaker story. It's also evident that the author has done considerable research through the years, listening to Haudenosaunee elders. It's important to bring these stories to readers. However, artists, whether they be writers, musicians or others should endeavour to be truthful about claims of Indigenous heritage, as false claims diminish the power of these stories.

Book Details:

The Peacemaker by Joseph Bruchac

New York: Dial Books For Young Readers   2021
154 pp.

Beyond Amelia by Heather Stemp

Beyond Amelia is the third book in the Ginny Ross Series. It is August 1940 and Ginny finds herself alone at Purdue University Airport. Her best friends Jamie and Jack, boyfriend Matt, have enlisted and are at Lowry Field in Colorado. Her friend Mabel has a job as the assistant manager of food services at Langley Air Base in Virginia. They all hope to end up in the same base.

Ginny is feeling left behind. Like her friends, she too wants to help stop Hitler from invading Britain. But the US Army Air Corps doesn't accept female pilots. Cap Aretz, her flying instructor, tells Ginny he has a job for her, dusting crops.

At the home of Professor and Mrs. Abernathy, where Ginny rents out their spare bedroom, she tells them about Cap's offer. It will help because her family back in Newfoundland is struggling. Her father only has part time work in Toronto and can't send money home, so her mother and younger brother Billy are just getting by. Ginny receives a short letter from Matt that offers few details about his posting.

The next day Ginny and another pilot, Frank Bracken dust crops at two nearby farms. They continue this work throughout August, earning more flying hours. In late August, Cap informs Frank about  the Clayton Knight Committee's search for experienced pilots to fly bombers to Britain. The pilots need to be instrument rated with three hundred hours of logged flying. The pay is substantial: five hundred dollars for an aircraft captain, four hundred dollars for copilots and three hundred for radio operators. While both Frank and Ginny have the requirements, Cap tells her it's "Men only."

Undeterred by this, Ginny formulates a plan. She approaches Mrs. Abernathy telling her she wants to look like a boy so she can fly for the military. At first Clara Abernathy refuses to agree and becomes upset, telling Ginny it's too dangerous, that she could crash or be caught. When her husband, Charles returns home and learns of Ginny's plan, initially he too is shocked. Ginny explains how her plan might succeed: she looks like her brother Billy and that with a haircut and some of the Professor's old clothing it could work. She would also need to change her name to Jimmy Ross which would require the Abernathy's to readdress her letters, so that her family didn't know what she was doing. She would also need to open a bank account so she could send money to her family. 

The next morning the Abernathy's agree to help Ginny. And they also decide to hide this plan from their housekeeper, Mildred, who likes to talk!  Cap also decides to help Ginny. And in a stroke of luck, Frank Bracken's wife refuses to allow him to go to Canada to fly bombers. Over the following three weeks, Clara alters her husband's suit and clothing to fit Ginny. Cap teachers her how to walk like a man and how to defend herself. With her new identity and a plan in place, Ginny, now Jimmy Ross, sets out for Montreal, Canada and the adventure of a lifetime.

Discussion

Heather Stemp uses the real life event of the RAF Ferry Operation initiated by Britain in 1940, to bring Hudson bombers to the country in the fight against Nazi Germany. The novel covers the period from November 1940 to February 1941. 

As Ginny Ross does in Beyond Amelia, there are many records of women disguising themselves as men to participate in war as soldiers. It's possible that up to one thousand women fought as soldiers in the American Civil War. Others fought in the Revolutionary War or the American-Mexican war.  

In the novel, Ginny disguised at Jimmy meets Jacqueline (Jackie) Cochran who discovers her secret. Jackie Cochran was a real female pilot and friend of Amelia Earhart. She was a well known pilot who had won several airplane races and had set several speed records. Jackie was considered the best woman pilot in the United States by 1938. Jackie was the first woman to fly a bomber, the American built Lockheed Hudson V, across the Atlantic Ocean. Jackie reached out to Eleanor Roosevelt in 1939 to propose that the Army Air Force create a women's pilot division. These women pilots could take on the non-military flights, freeing up men for combat flights. Eventually the Women's Auxiliary Ferrying Squad was created in 1942 headed by Nancy Harkness Love. It should be noted that the only country in which women flew combat missions was the Soviet Union. They became known as the "Night Witches".

Ginny is motivated to disguise herself as a male pilot by her desire to both help Britain fight Hitler and also support her struggling family during the end of the Depression. She also keenly feels the injustice of having the same qualifications of pilots like Frank Bracken, yet being disqualified because she's a woman. However, what seems to be a workable plan soon reveals to Ginny that the risks she's taking are enormous and could have serious consequences.

Most of the tension in the novel centers around one the risk of Jimmy's true identity being discovered. It is one of the men, Wright who senses that there is something different about "Jimmy" and he becomes obsessed with finding out what that something is. This sets up a sort of "cat and mouse" game between Wright and Jimmy, as Wright moves from making sarcastic remarks to watching Jimmy's every move. Ginny's cover is almost blown when Matt Baker shows up at Newfoundland Airport. He warns her that it's only a matter of time before she's discovered. "I saw danger in flying the North Atlantic in the winter, but I didn't see danger in the men around me. Was I being naïve?" 

Stemp builds the backstory as to why Wright is focused on Jimmy. It's evident that he resents Jimmy was made co-pilot when he's only eighteen years old. After one too many drinks, Wright reveals that he is struggling with resentment and jealousy over his overachieving younger brother who is at West Point. To compensate, he's lied to his parents about being a pilot in the ferry service. 

When the Hudson she's crewing crashes at the Newfoundland Airport, Jimmy reveals his true identity to Joan Parsons and her mother. This leads to a set up with Joan becoming Jimmy's girlfriend, but even that doesn't stall Wright. Eventually the situation between Jimmy and Wright escalates to the point that he grabs Jimmy and tries to put his hand down his shirt. 

Ginny eventually comes to realize the true nature of the danger she's in after Tex, a pilot she respects refuses to accept that women can do the job too. She realizes that it's the attitude of men that will need to change before women can take their place in the world of aviation.  "As we walked, a new understanding crept into my mind. I was in danger from the men around me. Wright's attack was a shock, and my first realization that Matt was right. Tex had just shocked me again with his opinion of female pilots. He'd been Jimmy's friend and mentor, but if he knew his co-pilot was a girl, how would he react? At this point, I didn't know."

While Jimmy's identity is eventually discovered, the people who know keep the secret, preserving Jimmy/Ginny from any serious consequences, although one wonders how the situation with income tax would have been worked out!

Beyond Amelia is well-written and engaging. Stemp has created the possibility of a fourth novel with Ginny flying for the Women's Auxiliary Ferrying Squad in the United States. Although the RCAF (Royal Canadian Air Force) did form a Canadian Women's Auxiliary Air Force, it did not allow women to work as pilots, as in the United Kingdom or in the United States. The author has included a short note at the back detailing some information about the ferrying operation and there are several black and white photographs of Amelia Earhart and Jackie Cochran, a Hudson bomber, and the Newfoundland Airport as it existed during this era.

Book Details:

Beyond Amelia by Heather Stemp

Halifax: Nimbus Publishing Limited   2024
249 pp.

Jella Lepman and Her Library of Dreams by Katherine Paterson

Jella was born in 1891 in Stuttgart, Germany, the eldest daughter of a Jewish couple, Josef and Flora Lehmann. Her father owned a men's clothing store. Jella and her two sisters attended an elite academy that had been founded almost a century earlier by Queen Katharina. After graduation, Jella attended a boarding school near Lausanne, Switzerland.  When her education was finished, Jella, who was an accomplished musician, dreamed of becoming a concert pianist. However, her father would not allow this. Besides her passion for music, Jella also loved books and so she opened a reading room for the children of immigrants who came to work in the tobacco factory in Stuttgart.

In 1913, Jella married Gustav Lepman who was fourteen years her senior. Gustav had been born in Germany to American parents who had moved to the country to manage a duvet factory in Feuerbach. Within a few years, Gustav was drafted into the German army during World War I. Jella and Gustave had two children, Anne-Marie in 1918 and Gunther in 1921.

In 1922, tragedy struck when Gustav died of a heart attack likely brought on by the trauma he experienced during the war. He was forty-five years old. His insurance policy of one hundred thousand Reichsmarks was almost worthless due to inflation in Germany. This meant that Jella, now a thirty-one year old widow need to work.

Jella found work as a journalist, becoming editor of the Stuttgarter Neues Tagblatt (New Daily Paper), the first woman to edit the paper. She wrote about childrens' books and womens' issues. During this time, Jella became politically active, joining the German Democratic Party, becoming a leader in the women's section. She ran for a seat in the 1930 elections to the Reichstag. At this time Germany was in economic and political chaos, fearful of the threat from Russian communism. They blamed their Jewish citizens for the situation. A world wide depression made this situation even worse.

The leader of the National Socialist Party (the Nazi party) was Adolf Hitler. He promised the German people he would restore their country by establishing law and order, and ridding the country of communists and Jews. In 1933, Hitler, with the support of the German people and the industrialists, rose to power and began to enact his policies. Jella who was Jewish, lost her job. Eventually, in 1936 as the situation in Germany became increasingly dangerous, Jella and her children fled to Italy. However, Italy too was not safe as its leader, Benito Mussolini was aligned with Hitler. Fortunately an Italian friend found nineteen year old Anne-Marie a job in England, while Gunther was accepted into a boarding school there.  As a result Jella also emigrated to England.

She found work reviewing and cataloguing an Austrian Jewish novelist's literary papers, and worked as a journalist and editor for the BBC and the American Broadcasting Station in Europe. She also authored a book about women in Nazi Germany.

When the war was over in 1945, Jella and many other international journalists, including the women editors of American fashion magazines, were involved in publishing a new magazine. This magazine was called Frau and Welt (Women and World) and its purpose was to rehabilitate Europe so ruined by war.

Then Jella received a request to return to Germany to an "advisor on the cultural and educational needs of women and children". She would be working in the area of Germany that was occupied by the Allies, including the Americans. This was a startling request that shook Jella. However, she remembered the fear and loneliness she had witnessed in Jewish children of the Kindertransport.  She felt that German's children would need help to recover from the war. This was to become Jella's life work, rebuilding childrens' hearts and minds in Germany through books and art.

Discussion

Katherine Paterson, author of Newberry Medal winners, Bridge To Terabithia, and Jacob Have I Loved, has written an engaging account of the efforts of Jella Lepman to help a generation of children recover from the trauma of war. 

A tour by Jella through the Allied occupied zone revealed the total destruction of many cities she had once called home, cities such as Frankfurt and Stuttgart.  In addition she met German citizens, some of whom were deeply ashamed of their country's actions, like Professor Alfred Weber, and others like the porter at the Tagblatt Tower where Jella once worked who had acquiesced to the Nazi regime and published their propaganda. What profoundly touched her however, was the suffering of the children, many of whom were orphaned and lived on the street in gangs

Jella and her family had managed to escape the Holocaust and live in England during the war. In spite of the hatred shown by her by her own country, Jella now responded with compassion, especially towards Germany's children whom she believed were innocent and who were the key to a different future for Germany. Jella's empathy allowed her to see the effects of the war on the children. She believed that Germany's children "...will show the grown-ups the way to go forward." She believed one way to help Germany's children was using books as "nourishment for the soul." In Jella's mind, "...the first messengers of that peace will be these children's books..."  

Jella's determination and creative approach to this daunting task and any problems that she encountered are well portrayed. For example because so many German children's books were banned and destroyed by the Nazis, Jella needed to find books that would interest children and be suitable for an exhibition. Undaunted and with the backing of General McClure, Jella wrote letters to publishers in twenty countries pleading for picture books and art work by each country's children. The response was overwhelming and the International Exhibition of Children's Books opened on July 5, 1946. The exhibition was held in the repurposed Nazi museum known as Haus der Kunst (House of Art) in Munich. 

Jella was not content to just have an exhibition. She published paper copies of The Story of Ferdinand by Munro Leaf and illustrated by Robert Lawson, so that children could have their own copy to read. She also managed to convince Walt Disney to allow the showing of Snow White in Germany. The film had been released in 1937 but German children were not able to view the movie.  She had to overcome strong opposition in Germany and the United States to create an International Youth Library. Her lecture tour allowed her to meet with Eleanor Roosevelt who was very supportive of Jella's work but she also encountered prejudice against opening the children's library in Germany which had unleashed so much suffering on the world. Jella was up to the task of countering this by asking people to give Germany's children a chance. Amid the growing tensions between the United States and Soviet Russia, the International Youth Library opened in 1949 in Munich. Jella's efforts to foster peace through childrens books continued with the formation of IBBY or International Board on Books for Young People. She even travelled to the Middle East promoting the use of children's books as a way to foster peace.

Helping to portrayed Jella Lepman's work are the illustrations by Sally Deng, rendered in pencil and digitally coloured. Katherine Paterson has written an informative and engaging picture book about a woman who seems to be largely unknown today. But Jella Lepman showed the world what forgiveness, empathy and compassion can accomplish along with the power of books.

Book Details:

Jella Lepman and Her Library of Dreams by Katherine Paterson

San Francisco: Handprint Books    2025
105 pp.

All The Blues In the Sky by Renee Watson

Thirteen-year-old Sage didn't know best friends could die. But one month ago, on her birthday, her best friend died. "And a good day, turned into a bad day, turned into the worst day."

Sage lives with her dad in Harlem, but visits her mom every other weekend. She's been doing this since sixth grade when her parents divorced. Her brother Spencer, lives on campus at Howard University, and spends his summers studying abroad, so he's never really home.

Sage wasn't with her friend when she was hit by a speeding car as she was walking to Sage's house. They were going to spend the day together. Initially her friend wanted to spend time 

Sage attends a grief group that includes Ebony whose dad died from a heart attack, Zay who lost her grandmother, Ana whose twin sister died from leukemia and DD whose brother was murdered by police during a traffic stop. Sage struggles in the grief group because she feels Ana and Zay don't understand what she feels: they got to say good-bye while she did not. She feels lonely, sad and guilty. Ms. Carver, who runs the group has given everyone in the group a journal to write down any questions they have so their mind can be free to think about other things.

On Saturday, Sage's Aunt Ini visits from Brooklyn. Sage and her best friend often spent time with her aunt. She forces Sage to get out of bed and takes her to Harlem Meer, where they go to Chelsea Market to look at jewelry and taste samples. Aunt Ini tells Sage she will miss her friend every day of her life but that these memories will comfort her.

Sage continues to go to school and attend grief group,  joining the Fly Girl program. Along the way, she finds comfort, acceptance, and an understanding of the tragedy that has touched her life.

Discussion

All The Blues in the Sky is a novel, written in free verse, that explores the guilt that loved ones sometimes experience with the death of a family member or friend as well as grief and the pain of loss. The novel is narrated by thirteen-year-old Sage, whose best friend, unnamed until the end of the novel, was killed by a drunk driver while walking to Sage's home for her birthday party.

To help her deal with what has happened Sage attends a grief group at her school that is led by Ms. Carver. However, initially Sage isn't very keen on the group because she believes that some of the girls attending do not understand the grief and guilt she is feeling and so she holds back.  Ms. Carver explains how grief can bring about guilt "...guilty for surviving, for still being here, enjoying life after your loved one is gone. Guilt about laughing and having good days..."

After the others in the grief group admit to what makes them have feelings of guilt, Sage expresses why she has feelings of guilt: she believes she is responsible for her friend's death. Her best friend wanted to go to a skate party on Sage's birthday but Sage was insistent they spend the entire day together, turning down her friend's offer to attend the skate party with her.  And so this led her friend to be in the street, on her way to Sage's house, when she was hit by the drunk driver.  "And if I had said something different, something not Birthday Girl selfish, she wouldn't have been walking from her house to my house at 11:15a.m....She wouldn't have been crossing the street when a drunk driver sped through the streets of Harlem..." Not only that but when her friend didn't show up, Sage assumed the worst of her friend, that she had lied to her, and gone to the skate party. And so she sent her angry texts. 

In reflecting on what happened Sage admits to herself that the reason she didn't want to attend the skate party was because she was afraid her friend was beginning to like her coding friends better and that she was afraid of both of them making new friends. The fact that Sage can finally admit this to herself is a first big step towards her beginning to process what happened and heal. 

Sage's feelings about how she behaved lead her to question whether she was a good friend. She wonders if "...her doing more for me and less for her made me feel guilty, like maybe I was not a good friend." She has other questions too. Ms. Carver tells the group that "questions are a part of grief". "Is killing someone just as devastating as losing someone? Does the driver of the hit and run have nightmares too?" Sage wants to know what her friend's parents will do with their daughter's belongings. She wants to know why "out of all the blocks to walk down and corners to cross and red lights to run...why did that car crash into at the time it did?"  Sage has questions about grief too. "Well, I want to know how long I'll be sad, and I want to know if I'll ever feel normal again. And what am I supposed to do on her birthday or on the anniversary of the accident? And what if I forget the sound of her voice?"  And later on Sage wonders, "Did she know how much I loved her?....Was our friendship enough?"  Even in her aviation class, Sage questions, "Why, when so many people keep living, did my best friend die?"

These are all timeless questions that most people experience following the death of a loved one. They are difficult questions sometimes without a definitive answer. For Sage, some understanding comes from the grief group, from her friends, and from her beloved Aunt Ini. Her mathematics class and her aviation class also offer Sage a different perspective on what has happened.

Watson uses mathematics as a metaphor for relationships, using it to portray how Sage finally comes to understand what her Aunt Ini has told her about losing someone. Sage loves mathematics because she feels in control, where there are answers and solutions. Sage's teacher, Mr. Dixon tells the class, "It's important to understand that transversal lines develop angle relationships....Understanding angle relationships in math will help you understand your personal, real-life relationships." He tells the class, "Not every person that comes into your life has a parallel to yours. We can't all be mirrors of each other. There are people -- like transversal lines-- that cross paths with yours, only for a moment. In that short moment, you connect, have something in common, but still you have your own unique experience." At this point, Sage doesn't realize how this relates to her and her view of the other girls in the grief group. 

Sage believes that two of the girls in the grief group, Ana and Zay simply do not understand what she, Ebony and DD are going through because they got to say good-bye to the people they loved, and they saw death coming. She believes that their experience of death was different because they had a warning that death was imminent. Sage carries this judgement throughout many of the meetings and she admits to tuning out Ana and Zay, believing they have nothing to offer her. Eventually, Sage expresses this sentiment. "I understand that someone they loved died, but it isn't the same. They talk about months, weeks of goodbyes and quality time. I didn't have that. Neither did DD or Ebony. And I'm tired of talking about it like it's the same. ,, But to say you know how I feel, to say we are the same...no. You knew death was coming. You got to say good-bye."  This results in Sage being  out of the group until she apologizes.  

 In a class weeks later, Mr. Dixon tells the students, "when parallel lines are cut by a transversal line, four types of angles are formed. Those angles have a relationship. While some of them are congruent, the others are supplementary." Sage realizes this relates to everyone in the grief group.

"A transversal thing happened to me, to Ebony, to DD, 

to Ana, to Zay.

And that one thing that touched us

was the same thing and wasn't the same thing.

And it brought us together, made us relate to each other.

Similar, not the same. Connected forever."

Sage now understands that her life was intersected by the transversal lines of Ebony, DD, Ana and Zay because of death . For some, the "angles" or experiences of death were congruent or similar to what Sage, Ebony and DD experienced, but for others it was like that of Ana and Zay. She comes to understand that death brought them together, but their experiences were all quite different. Sage now understands what her Aunt Ini was trying to tell her, "Just because everybody's pain looks different, don't mean it hurts less." 

Another metaphor used by Watson in the novel is that of flying. After her friend's death, Sage isn't interested in attending the Fly Girl program. To Sage, being in her aviation class was similar to math class, "...There will be answers and reasons and formulas to help me make sense of the unknown." Sage is hoping that the Fly Girl program will give her the answers she's seeking. Ebony tells her that if she thinks about what Ms. Carver tells them during the grief group she will find those answers but for Sage, who enjoys the logic and finiteness of mathematics, that's just not the case at this time.

The Fly Girl classes help Sage process her grief in a more positive way. The Fly Girl instructor, Ms. Barbara tells the class that the mathematics of how a plane flies are incomplete, that we don't fully understand how a plane is able to fly. This makes Sage realize that science doesn't have all the answers and that maybe she does need to return to the grief group. In a discussion about turbulence encountered while flying, Ms. Barbara states that planes are designed to handle the phenomena, that it is "uncomfortable but normal" and that "...life's turbulence is the same way.", unsettling, unexpected but something we are often able to pass through.

Thinking about flying and being in sky, leads Sage to think about the various blues pilots see in the sky: light blue, white blue, blue violet and even midnight blue. 

"And sometimes life is blue too.

Blue is the empty chair at the desk in the classroom

where my best friend used to sit.

Blue is the ache in my heart when I pick up the phone

to call her and remember she's gone...

Blue is all the calm, all the heartbreak, all the  hope,

all the tears, all the laughter."

Sage wonders if maybe blue is the colour of love, because "For all the blues in the sky, there are as many blues in the heart." 

Eventually, Sage begins to experience healing. She has some of her doubts and guilt alleviated when her friend's sister, Brielle brings her a letter that was found at the scene of the accident. The letter written to Sage, tells why her friend loves her so much and it offers Sage relief and peace. When she visits her friend's home, Sage finds a box filled with mementos of their friendship. This confirms to Sage that she was loved by her friend. 

"Not only because of her letter to me

but because of all that's here, saved in this box.

She kept me, kept our friendship. sacred."

This in turn helps her to process the news that her beloved Aunt Ini has terminal cancer and as with her friend's death, more questions. By now Sage knows that life can be full of loss but that if she has children she will tell them despite this "to love without regret" and that it is okay to feel all the love, sadness and anger that loss can bring.

Once again, Renee Watson has written a profoundly beautiful and engaging story, this time focusing on  the pain of loss and the grief people feel following the death of a beloved friend. All The Blues In The Sky tackles the questions about death and grief that many children have, and that often parents and other adults never address. What's interesting in this novel, is that the main character, Sage never really has a serious discussion with either her mother or father about what's happened. Her beloved Aunt Ini however, does seem to understand that Sage is struggling over the death of her friend and in her quiet way, offers Sage some wisdom that helps her towards healing. In Sage, Renee Watson has crafted a likeable, believable character. Her voice and her experience of raw grief and sadness will resonate with those young teens who have suffered a similar loss. Highly recommended.

Book Details:

All The Blues In The Sky by Renee Watson

New York: Bloomsbury Children's Books

182 pp.

The House On The Canal by Thomas Harding

A building located in the middle of Amsterdam next to a canal was referred to by Anne Frank as "the old house on the canal."  That house had it's beginnings long ago. 

In 1580, the land where the "tall, narrow house" would come to stand was part of a marshland filled with field mice and seagulls. In the 1600's people came to build a canal that had strong walls. In 1635, a stonemason built a brick house with a green door close to the canal. When he required more space, the stonemason built an annex at the back of the house. More homes were built next to the house, one with blue shutters, another with red shutters, as well as a church with bells that rang four times every hour. 

In 1653, the house was the home of a woman with twelve children. She had fled persecution because of her Christian beliefs.  The plague raged along the canal in 1709, but the woman and her family survived. She lived for many years there. The Great Frost came, freezing the canal, meaning that food and water could not be supplied to the people that lived hear the canal. Eventually a wealthy merchant and his wife moved into the rundown house, repainting and repairing the annex. Although they had no children there were parties and many of their friends visited. Eventually the merchant died and his wife moved out of the house. After many winters, the ground floor of the house became stables for horses. It soon became a place of business.

By 1880 the house on the canal was still used as a home with people living in both the front and the annex in the back. The area around the house and the canal smelled like rotten eggs. In 1884 a fire raged blistering the brick walls but firefighters saved the house. In the early 1900's the house once again became the home for a family, an ironmonger, his wife and children. The stage was set for the house to play an important part in a war that saw millions killed.

Discussion

The House On The Canal is a picture book that traces the history of the house that would become known as the Anne Frank House, so named because it was where Anne Frank and her family along with the van Pels family and a dentist hid from the Nazis during the occupation of Holland in World War II. In the back matter of the book, the author writes that the house was built on a canal, called the Prinsengracht (or Prince's Canal) by Dirk van Delft in 1635. He eventually added on to the rear of the house, an addition called the annex which would play a part in hiding Anne and seven others.

Although Harding doesn't mention them by name in his account, in the back matter he does identify the people mentioned: Baefje Bisschop was the woman with twelve children who found refuge in the home, the wealthy merchant was Isaac van Vleuten who moved into the house in 1740 with his wife Cornelia, the ironmonger was Alle Pieron who moved into the house in 1901.Of course many readers will know that the "...tall man in a fine suit" was Otto Frank and the "young girl with a sweet smile" was his daughter Anne.

Otto Frank moved his businesses into the house in 1940 but when the Nazis began rounding up the Jewish people in Amsterdam in 1942, he moved his family into the top three floors of the annex where they lived hidden for over two years. Sadly Anne and the other Jewish people were betrayed by an unknown person and sent to concentration camps. Only Otto would survive the war, returning to Amsterdam in 1945. Anne's diary had been recovered from the annex by two of Otto's employees, Miep Gies and Bep Voskuijl. It was given to Otto upon his return. The house was bought by NY Berghaus who were convinced by Otto Frank to donate it. More than a million people visit the restored house annually.

Thomas Harding previously authored a picture book about a house his great-grandfather built outside of Berlin prior to World War II, exploring the unique history of that house and how his family lost and then regained it. In this latest offering, Harding explores the history of a better known house, the annex that was the hiding place of Anne Frank and her family during World War II. Readers are taken back to the very beginning, before the canal existed and before the house was built. The timeline approach, with each two page spread featuring a specific year, identified in the upper right corner of the right page, offers readers a coherent and easy to follow story. Readers can see how, over a period of centuries, a house can be used in many different ways: as a home for a family,  as a place of work and sometimes as a place of refuge. The simple text is accompanied by illustrations done in mixed media by illustrator, Britta Teckentrup.

The House On The Canal offers a unique and interesting way to introduce young readers to the story of Anne Frank. Although there is a photograph of the Annex taken in 1954, a more recent colour photograph of the house, along with a photograph of Anne Frank would have put a face to the name.

Book Details:

The House On The Canal by Thomas Harding
Somerville, Mass.: Candlewich Studio     2025

Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins

It is the fiftieth annual Hunger Games but it is also the Second Quarter Quell, meaning twice as many tributes will be reaped: two boys and two girls from each district. Taken "off to the Capitol for slaughter." It is also Haymitch Abernathy's sixteenth birthday. His plans, besides the reaping, are to spend time with his girlfriend, Lenore Dove.

Haymitch lives with his Ma and his ten-year-old brother Sid. His Ma takes in laundry to make ends meet. His pa is buried in the Abernathy family plot in the miner's graveyard. He died in a fire in the mines that some say was an act of resistance.

Haymitch visits Hattie Meeney whom he helps with her illegal distillery business. She gives him a bottle of white liquor as a birthday gift. He doesn't drink, but Haymitch knows he can trade this off for something else. He then meets up with his girlfriend, Lenore Dove who is one of the Covey, in the meadow. Lenore has been raised by her uncles, Clerk Carmine and Tam Amber, after her mother died during childbirth. Lenore gives Haymitch a flint striker shaped like a "C" with two animals, a snake and a long-necked bird facing one another.

Just prior to the reaping ceremony, Haymitch's mother gives him a year's supply of flour sack underwear and a new pocketknife while Sid gives him a piece of flint rock. 

The reaping ceremony takes place at the square in front of the Justice Building. There are posters as well as many Peacekeepers who are checking in the young reaping candidates - those children aged twelve to eighteen. Attendance is mandatory for everyone. Haymitch has twenty slips of paper in the reaping. The additional slips are due to his getting extra food for his family, so the odds are not in his favour. After the Panem anthem, Mayor Allister readers the Treaty of Treason. Then Drusilla Sickle, the escort for the  District 12 tribunes each year, does the draw. Thirteen-year-old Louella McCoy and Maysilee Donner are chosen for the girls, while Woodbine Chance and eighteen-year-old Wyatt Callow are chosen for the boys. Each makes their way up to the dias, when suddenly Woodbine, known for his ability to run fast, sprints down an alley, only to be shot in the head by a sniper. 

This causes chaos and the feed on the TV screens goes dark as there is a five minute broadcast delay so that the rest of the country isn't able to witness what's happening. Everyone is ordered on the ground while the Peacekeepers remove anyone with gore on them from the square. When Haymitch gets up to protect Lenore as she's trying to help Woodbine's distraught mother, he gets hit with the butt of a rifle. Furious, Drusilla orders him as the replacement for Woodbine and attempts to have Lenore shot. However, Plutarch Heavensbee, responsible for doing promo for the Games, intervenes, telling Drusilla he wants to keep Lenore to publicize the tearful goodbyes.  

The broadcast resumes with the naming of Wyatt and Haymitch. He is relieved to see Lenore spared due to bribes from Clerk Carmine and Tam Amber. Maysilee's father unsuccessfully attempts to bribe anyone to save his daughter. Haymitch's ma is distraught as is his little brother Sid.  Drusilla refuses to allow the families to say goodbye to their reaped children as is usually done. Again Plutarch intevenes, telling her he needs more shots for his recap.This gives Haymitch the chance to hug his Ma and Sid and say goodbye. As the train pulls out of the District 12 station, he sees Lenore Dove, screaming in rage into the wind.

On the train Haymitch, Louella, Wyatt and Maysilee watch a recap of the reaping from all the districts. There is no evidence of what really transpired in District 12. Plutarch tells them that he's attempting to help them out,  by selling them to potential sponsors. When they see the well fed, well trained, "Careers", children from Districts 1 to 4 who have been trained to win the Hunger Games, Haymitch feels intimidated. However, Plutarch tells him that brains, skills, strategy and luck all factor in to who wins. Haymitch believes Plutarch is simply manipulating them for the Capitol's gain.

At the Tribute center, each tribute is "prepped". Haymitch's team is comprised of Proserpina and Vitus who are university students. District 12's stylist is Magno Stift who has a terrible reputation for doing nothing and provides them with smelly black miner overalls and plastic miner hats. They are taken to the stables where each district's tributes are loaded into twelve chariots. Haymitch and his fellow District 12 tributes are placed into "a rickety chariot drawn by a quarter of skittish gray nags." With Maysilee and Louella at the front and Haymitch and Wyatt at the back their chariot enters the arena last. A firework explodes in front of their chariot, causing the horses to break into a run, colliding with the spiked wheels of District 6. Hamitch and Louella are thrown out, killing Louella instantly. Wyatt and Maysilee are also thrown out but uninjured. 

Furious at Louella's death, Haymitch takes her body dodging Peacekeepers and tributes, runs towards the president's mansion at the end of the arena. He hijacks District 1's golden chariot and races it to just underneath the mansion's balcony where he lays Louella's body. In an act of defiance, Haymitch claps, demonstrating to President Snow that her death is on him. This challenge to President Snow will not go unpunished, as Haymitch is soon to learn and will have devastating consequences for everyone he loves.

Discussion

Sunrise on the Reaping is the second prequel to Suzanne Collins' Hunger Games trilogy. It tells the story of Haymitch Abernathy during the fiftieth Hunger Games and the Second Quarter Quell. Haymitch seeks to resist the ongoing yearly murder of young people from the districts but in doing so, he sets himself up as the target of President Snow's revenge with devastating consequences. 

This novel explores the role of propaganda and lies, and the use of terror to control and subjugate a population to prevent it from rebelling against oppression and tyranny. It also asks readers to consider what motivates a population to finally decide to rebel under such total control?

One method of propaganda is the use of posters, a theme that carries throughout the novel by Haymitch Abernathy. The first description of propaganda are the posters that Haymitch describes in the square where the reaping ceremony is held. The Capitol has plastered the square in District 12 and likely in the other districts, with posters with the theme of "No Peace". They read, "NO PEACE, NO BREAD!" or "NO PEACE, NO SECURITY!", "NO CAPITOL, NO PEACE!" A huge banner with the face of President Snow promotes him as "PANEM'S #1 PEACEKEEPER."  Haymitch sees similar posters at the train station in the Capitol but this time geared to the residents there. as though the Capitol has to convince it's own citizens that this how things must be. The message is that without the Capitol there will be no peace, no security and no bread. Even more important, "NO HUNGER GAMES, NO PEACE!"  It is an ongoing attempt to maintain the status quo - that is - the annual reaping of young boys and girls from the districts as reparation for the rebellion against the Capitol years ago. But Haymitch is determined to paint his own poster and not allow the Capitol to use him as a "poster boy".

In an attempt to make it seem that the Capitol has total control over the districts and that they willingly comply, broadcasts of the reaping and the Hunger Games are manipulated and sanitized. When Woodbine Chance is murdered at the reaping, Haymitch realizes for the first time that the broadcast is not live, but that there is a five minute delay so they can whitewash any dissent or rebellion. Instead of showing the murder of Woodbine, the unrest in the square, the intervention of Haymitch to protect Lenore, and Drusilla's order to shoot Lenore, the broadcast is halted and evidence quickly removed. Haymitch is ordered to be the replacement for Woodbine and once the gore is cleaned up, the broadcast resumes, complete with canned applause. Later on the train Haymitch admits to being sickened by the false narrative that Plutarch has created. "I watch, both fascinated and sickened by the flawless transition from Maysilee's drawing to Wyatt's and mine. Not even a hint of Woodbine's shooting or the turmoil that followed. And there's my name, and there's me, and there's Ma gasping, Sid crying. Lenore Dove with her hand clasped over her mouth." He tells Plutarch, "That's not what happened." but Plutarch merely states that he changed things around to help them get sponsors. However, the reality is that people in the Capitol and the other districts do not know that a young boy was murdered trying to flee the reaping. Likewise Haymitch and everyone else in Panem do not know if there have been other similar situations in other districts. This serves President Snow's desire for power and control. If others witness acts of rebellion, they might be encouraged to resist too.

The tributes themselves are also used as propaganda. Plutarch arranges for a beautiful birthday cake to be presented to Haymitch, but Haymitch knows what Plutarch is doing. "Clearly, Plutarch wants to capture my delight so he can broadcast it all over Panem. Look how well the Capitol treats the tributes. How forgiving they are to their enemies. How superior they are to those district piglets in their stinkholes." Haymitch refuses to cooperate and be a part of that propaganda and turns his back. He won't be a poster boy for how thoughtful the Capitol is towards the tributes whom they are sending to their death.

Haymitch has no doubt about his part in the Hunger Games. "I'm entirely the Capitol's plaything. They will use me for their entertainment and then kill me, and the truth will have no say in it. Plutarch acts friendly, but his indulgences -- my family's goodbyes, his fancy sandwiches -- are just a method to manage me..."  He remembers what his Ma reminded him about his Pa's message to a girl reaped, "Don't let them use you, Sarshee. Don't let them paint their posters with your blood..."

When chaos occurs during the chariot parade resulting in the death of Louella, Haymitch decides he wants to show the Capitol citizens what really is happening and who is to blame. He sees the Peacekeepers rushing to take away Louella's body and decides to act. " They want to take Louella away, to hide her tidily in a wooden box along with their crimes, and ship her home to District 12. They don't want to feature this death on the Capitol's watch, unplanned and highlighting their incompetence. This is not the blood they want to paint their posters with."

And so Haymitch takes Louella's body and lays it below the balcony where President Snow can see her, in front of all at the parade. He then applauds, placing the blame for Louella's death on Snwo.  While the people in the area see what's happened, Haymitch has no idea if what's happened is actually being broadcast because on one screen all he can see is himself from the waist up clapping. Later, in an attempt to thwart Haymitch's actions, President Snow has a replacement, a body double of "Louella McCoy" brought in so that people will believe Louella survived. However, this young girl is likely the child of traitors. She's been physically altered, drugged and programmed but who seems to still know that the Capitol is murdering children.

The recap broadcast during Haymitch's Victor Ceremony is also grossly distorted and leaves Haymitch stunned and disillusioned. The recap deviates from Day 2. "Timelines are twisted. Connections misleading. It's less flat-out lying than lying by omission." This manipulation of what actually happened distorts Haymitch's actions. "What they showed during the Games, I don't know, but in the recap, I'm not even attempting to protect any of my allies." Haymitch along with Ampert is involved in a plot to break the arena, however the damage they inflict is not shown. The distortion around Maysilee and Maritte's deaths make Haymitch wonder, "Does no one remember? Do they just not care? Or during the Games, did they show the audience a different sky? Or none at all?...The Gamemakers must have been scrambling like crazy to control the narratives by this point. Whatever the case, the audience here in the auditorium has embraced this version, cheering and jeering on cue. Their lack of discernment transforms the recap, validating it as truth. I hope those in the districts can still see it as the piece of propaganda it is, but no telling what they've been fed."  The recap doesn't paint Haymitch as a rebel, but possibly as a cheater or a rascal. 

The novel's title Sunrise on the Reaping is a reference to Lenore Dove's question to Haymitch as to why they should accept the current situation; that every year the sun will rise on yet another reaping. She asks why is this acceptable?  Like most people in the districts, Haymitch is resigned to the fact that every year there is a reaping and this year there is the second Quarter Quell which means twice as many kids. "No point in worrying, I tell myself, there's nothing you can do about it...No way to control the outcome of the reaping or what follows it...They've taken enough already."  Lenore Dove challenges Haymitch when he says everything is going to be fine. "...Because the reaping's going to happen no matter what I believe. Sure as the sun will rise tomorrow."  However, Lenore tells Haymitch, "Thinking things are inevitable. Not believing change is possible." is part of their trouble. She asks him, "Can you imagine it rising on a world without a reaping?"  It is a request she will reiterate later in the novel.

Collins uses the character of Plutarch to question why people accept tyranny and what pushes them to rebel. During the training session, Haymitch realizes that the tributes outnumber the Peacekeepers and could easily attack them. He is dismayed when he thinks about how " Every year we let them herd us into their killing machine. Every year they pay no price for the slaughter." Plutarch, overhearing Haymitch and Ringina asks them why they didn't act. Haymitch realizes he's not just questioning them not acting in the training gym but also why they don't resist in the districts. It is a challenge similar to that posed by Lenore Dove. Ringina states that it's because of the guns, but Plutarch presses further since the districts outnumber the Capitol. When Haymitch and Ringina state that it is the Capitol's firepower that forces them to submit, Plutarch counters, "I see the hangings and the shootings and the starvation and the Hunger Games...And yet, I still don't think the fear they inspire justifies the arrangement we've all entered into. Do you?...Why do you agree to it? Why do I? For that matter, why have people always agreed to it?"  Haymitch and Ringina have no answer.

However, as the events in the novel demonstrate, the districts do not fight back because Snow and the Capitol have absolute control and create absolute terror. Any act of defiance or resistance is brutally punished as evidenced by what happens to Incitatus Loomy, Haymitch, Beetee and Ampert, as well as Mags and Wiress. At the presidential mansion, Snow reveals that he plans for Haymitch to die in the Hunger Games for what he did during the chariot parade, indicating that Haymitch's death will mean that "...Lenore Dove and your family should be free to enjoy long and happy lives."  When Haymitch survives to win the Fiftieth Hunger Games, he knows all who he loves will suffer and all who helped him will also be punished. "I don't dare think about my loved ones back home. Everything I did, every choice I made, was based on the knowledge that my death protected them from harm.,,,This I know: I have been publicly challenging Snow and his Quarter Quell since I landed in the Capitol."  If Snow poisoned his own parade master for botching the chariot parade, Haymitch wonders just "what feast must he have in store for me and mine?"

Prior to returning home, Haymitch sees that even those who helped him do not escape unscathed. At the Victor's Ceremony, Haymitch's sees that his mentors, Mags and Wiress have been tortured "...Finally, Mags arrives in a wheelchair while a still-mobile but distressed Wiress twitches her head about in a birdlike fashion, a steady stream of words spouting from her lips. Very bad things have been done to them."

He quickly experiences the violence of Snow's revenge upon his arrival in District 12:  his mother and brother Sid die in a fire. After the Hunger Games, Haymitch has been able to learn that, Snow, who seemed to know about the Covey, knew and loved the Covey girl from District 12 who won the Tenth Hunger Games. Her apparent betrayal makes Haymitch fear for Lenore. "Oh , Lenore Dove, what have I done to you? How will you pay for my surviving the Hunger Games?"  

Lenore Dove, as she is dying from poison, begs Haymitch to not let the sun rise on another reaping. But Haymitch is so devastated by her death that he begins drinking heavily. The depth of his loss is portrayed by his remembrance of a song ( Edgar Allan Poe's The Raven) he learned on her last birthday. No one can help or heal Haymitch, not even Plutarch who hopes to recruit him to help grow the rebellion.  Haymitch refuses Plutarch's request to help them change things, because he believes he is "...living proof that the Capitol always wins. I tried to keep that sun from rising on another reaping day, I tried to change things, and now everybody's dead."  Haymitch doesn't trust Plutarch because he creates the propaganda that sustains the Capitol. At this time, Snow's brutal suppression of any hint of rebellion is still working to maintain power and control.

This prequel is another well written novel in the Hunger Games series, with believable characters, many of them endearing, some of them very memorable:  sweet Ampert, bold Maysilee, kindly Mags, vicious Drusilla, intelligent Wiress and of course, the cruel Coriolanus Snow. There is a mention of a relationship between two men, kept hidden for fear of reprisals by the Capitol.  The wealth of characters in the series opens the possibility for many more novels detailing the world of Panem.

Sunrise on the Reaping is a tale of tragedy and loss, how challenging evil often exacts a heavy price. The novel ends on a somewhat hopeful note: eventually Haymitch was able to fulfill his promise to Lenore Dove, by lending a hand in the destruction of Snow, and the defeat of the Capitol. Unlike Coriolanus Snow, Haymitch was able to love again, his heart not poisoned by betrayal and wanton cruelty. Katniss and Peeta offer Haymitch a chance to mourn his losses, something he was reluctant to do. "I didn't want to let them in, her and Peeta, but the walls of a person's heart are not impregnable, not if they have ever known love."

Book Details:

Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins

New York: Scholastic Press       2025

382 pp.