Real Kids. Good Books.
Our children are gorgeously diverse and they love a good read. At the heart of Real Kids/ Good Books are authors and illustrators who are building a new diverse canon, book by dazzling book.
Themes include: children of color, LGBTQ, adoption, special needs, math, science and writing. And of course there is also a mishmash of miscellany and reblogged tidbits that strike my fancy as they float by.
Thanks for stopping by.
-Kate
Great interview about Eight Days by student-journalist, Albert Ordonez. Even Danticat’s young daughter makes a brief appearance.
Eight Days (2010) by Edwidge Danticat, illustrated by Alix Delinois.
A young Haitian boy is saved after 8 days spent buried under rubble from the great earthquake in Haiti in 2010. Edwidge Danticat creates a poignant story of survival, focusing on how one young boy uses his imagination to get through those long 8 days alone.
When I was pulled from under my house, eight days after the earthquake, my family was there waiting.
The following day, everyone asked me,
Were you afraid?
Were you sad?
Did you cry?I was brave, I told them, but when the earth shook again and again, I was afraid. And sometimes I cried, because I missed Manman and Papa and my little sister, Justine. But in my mind, I played.
Yes, the young boy, Junior survives, but be prepared. His friend Oscar who is buried with him in the rubble passes away before he can be rescued. Danticat handles this delicately and with honest emotion, giving voice to the loss that many children in Haiti experienced.
