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Booktalk
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Background note about the author/selection
Patricia McCormick writes, “The trafficking of children has gotten a good deal of media attention. But nearly five years ago, when I had a chance meeting with a photographer who was working undercover to document the presence of young girls in brothels overseas, I knew immediately that I wanted to do what no one else had done so far: tell this heartbreaking story from the point of view of one individual girl.” McCormick did extensive research on the Nepalese sex trade of children and found that each year, 12, 000 girls are sold by their families. She wrote this book in honor of them. She believes “there is nothing more powerful --- or permanent --- than the impact of a book”.
Teenreads.com – Author Profile: Patricia McCormick
http://www.teenreads.com/authors/au-mccormick-patricia.asp#talk0609
Discussion guide for Sold is available-
http://www.hyperionbooksforchildren.com/board/displayBook.asp?id=1686
Quill Award 2007, Booklist Notable Book for Youth 2006, YALSA Best Books for Young Adults 2007.
Even though this is a difficult title to booktalk, I think that such an important, beautifully written book must be shared. As I reread the simple, poetic lines, I truly wanted to share it with students. The cover is intense using yellow, a color that can be associated with fear, and red, symbolizing power, anger, violence, and danger. How brilliant is the selection of using a real child's face, eyes only.
Booktalk
“My stepfather says that a girl is like a goat.
Good as long as she gives you milk and butter.
But not worth crying over when it’s time to make a stew”(McCormick, 2006).
It is monsoon season here in Himalayan Mountains.
The rain comes drip dripping; then gushing through gaps in the thatched roof.
Along with the constant wetness, the small stalks of our lives are ripped out by their roots and flow down the mountainside along with our hearts.
My stepfather does not work. Instead he loses what he does not have.
Ama no longer has her beautiful earrings.
There is nothing left to sell.
If I must, I can work hard as a maid in the town.
I will work for new thatch to patch the roof for Ama, and sweet fruits for the baby.
I am strong. I am not afraid to work.
It is decided. I will go away and be a maid. I will make them proud.
At Bajai Sita’s store, my stepfather fondles a roll of rupees and now I have a new Auntie.
Auntie and I begin walking.
The journey is long, so long. Over 2 days.
Walking, dusty walking – then sweltering buses.
I carry so little.
Only memories of the soft colored mountains of home.
Again rupees change hands. Enough to buy a water buffalo!
Now I have an Uncle Husband and we have finally arrived at Happiness House.
There is no clean mountain air here, no singing, sighing wind.
Only crooked sadness standing shoulder to shoulder in cramped lines.
Only vacant, aged stares, so sad, so hopeless.
Sooty sun clouds my own eyes with trembling fear.
I believe my journey is over, but how little I know. As it has begun in this House of Happiness,
So does it end.
For more information/curriculum suggestions:
This book presents a contemporary issue that is sure to resonate with young adults.
Born into Brothels [videorecording] is a film by Ross Kauffman and Zana Briski that could be used. While living in the red light district of Calcutta, documenting life in the brothels, photographer Zana Briski embarked on a project by which she gave cameras to the children of prostitutes and taught them photography.
This book might pair with Nectar in a Sieve by Kamala Markandaya.
This book tells the story of a peasant woman in India, married as a child bride to a tenant farmer, working with her husband to wrest a living from land ravaged by droughts, monsoons, and insects. Through years of poverty and disaster, she sees one of her infants die, her daughter become a prostitute, her sons leave for jobs she distrusts—and somehow she survives.
American slavery might also be examined – a couple of titles
A Million Nightingales by Susan Straight.
Moinette, a mixed-race child born into slavery on a Louisiana plantation, gains an education by listening to the lessons given her young mistress, and when she is sold and separated from her beloved mother at the age of fourteen, she immediately begins to make plans to gain her freedom.
Feeding the Ghosts by Fred D'Aguiar.
When a disease begins to kill the prisoners on the slave ship Zong, the captain orders all the slaves to be thrown overboard, but Mintah manages to hide on the ship and convince the remaining slaves that their only hope for freedom is to rebel.
Copper Sun by Sharon M. Draper.
Two fifteen-year-old girls--one a slave and the other an indentured servant--escape their Carolina plantation and try to make their way to Fort Moses, Florida, a Spanish colony that gives sanctuary to slaves.
The Slave Dancer: A Novel by Paula Fox
Kidnapped by the crew of an Africa-bound ship, a thirteen-year-old boy discovers to his horror that he is on a slaver and his job is to play music for the exercise periods of the human cargo.
References
Author Profile: Patricia McCormick. (1997-2008). Retrieved March 18, 2008, from
http://www.teenreads.com/authors/au-mccormick-patricia.asp#talk0609
Sold. (2003).Retrieved March 18, 2008, from
http://www.hyperionbooksforchildren.com/board/displayBook.asp?id=1686
Born into brothels. (2004). Thinkfilm.
D'Aguiar, F. (1997). Feeding the ghosts. Hopewell, NJ: Ecco Press.
Draper, S. (2006). Copper sun. New York: Atheneum Books for Young Readers.
Fox, P. (1973). The slave dancer. New York: Bradbury.
Markandaya, M. (1995). Nectar in a sieve. New York: Signet.
McCormick, P. (2006). Sold. New York: Hyperion.
These lesson plans, guides, and other resource materials for young adult literature topics were created by participants in a professional development course in young adult Literature. Each resource is copyrighted by the individual educator who developed the material. The present course being taught is titled: Teaching Young Adult Literature in the Classroom from the University of Wisconsin-Stout (Sharron L. McElmeel, instructor)
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