39. The Heaven Shop - Deborah Ellis

For: Middle school & YA
Fitzhenry & Whiteside (Canada) 2004
186 pages includes author's note and question/answer interview
Rating: 4

Contemporary Malawi, Africa.

Told from 13 year old Binti's point of view, we meet her, her 14 year old brother, Kwasi, and her 16 year old bossy sister, Junie. They live happily in Blantyre, the largest city in Malawi, with their father, who has a coffin-making business run from their modest home. It's called The Heaven Shop. The do well enough to be sent to private school to get a good educations, and Binti is an actress/reader in a radio program that everyone in the country hears in weekly serial form.

HIV and AIDS are everywhere, killing indiscriminately, and about a third of the way through the book, the father weakens and dies. His brothers and sisters take all the family belongings, sell the house and business, and separate the siblings, making them work like servants. Binti has been spoiled, but she becomes stronger and more sure of herself as she takes off to find the grandmother that she barely knows.

The story is one of hope, of course. There is much discussion about AIDS, its stigma, condoms, prostitution, and monthly menstrual cycles, which makes the book still a little too old for my fourth graders. But I'd love to see kids of a bit older persuasion read this - good information, and a clearcut look into the lives of people in subSaharan Africa.

Deborah Ellis wrote Breadwinner, one of my all-time favorite books, about a young girl dealing with the Taliban in Afghanistan. A Canadian writer with quite a few awards - well deserved awards -- Deborah Ellis is an author I am always pleased to read. This wa a good one.

Galimoto - Karen Lynn Williams

Illustrated by Catherine Stock
Harper Collins, 1990
32 pages
Endpapers: Dusty rose

I know, I know....this book is 20 years old and usually it's newer books that are blogged. But I've been researching books that can be used in the study of Africa and this one is a primo selection. I remember reading it years ago when it first came out, in the old Northeast Harbor Library children's room - which I miss greatly. Oh well, that's another story. I'll stick with this one...

"Galimoto means 'car' in Chichewa, the national language of Malawi, Africa. it is also the name for a type of push toy made by children. Old wires -- or sticks, cornstalks, and pieces of yam -- are shaped into cars, trucks, bicycles, trains, and helicopters. All of these intricate toys are known as galimoto (GAL-lee-moe-toe)."

One day Kondi starts looking everywhere for wire so that he can build a galimoto. He starts in the shoebox in which he keeps his treasured possessions. From there he goes to places around his village where he thinks he might be able to obtain more. During this day we learn about his village and his people's way of life. The illustrations that Catherine Stock drew - she notes that she traveled there to capture everything correctly - really help to realize the setting.

When I share this with my fourth graders - and I will - we are going to create galimotos. This will be right up their alley!

Good story. Great illustrations.