The Milk Of Birds

The Milk Of Birds

YA fiction
"Saida Noor does not have to finish because we all know what was
inside. Most of us have seen the blackened bones. We know the smell
that rides the smoke and seeps into your clothes and skin. Even if
you find water, you cannot wash it off."
Most of us here in America are lucky enough not to be familiar
with the look of charred human bones or the smell of burnt up
cadavers. No one should be. Especially kids. Nawra, protagonist of
Sylvia Whitman's The Milk Of Birds, is only fourteen when she makes
this observation. She is living in a displaced persons camp in
Darfur. Most of her loved ones have been slaughtered. Her mother is
mute with grief. A baby conceived by rape is growing in her.
There are, however, a few rays of hope in Nawra's life. Her
best friend, Abeeda, is strong, determined, and relatively educated.
There are some attempts to provide schooling and health care for the
camp residents. And she has been paired by an organization with a
fairly wealthy American girl, K. C., who will pay sponsorship money
for a year as they exchange letters. Their correspondance and the
experiences behind it are the text of a truly amazing novel.
You'd think, as I initially did, that a fairly well off American
private school student and a dirt poor African refugee would live in
worlds too far apart to have anything in common. But you would be
wrong. Their evolving relationship makes for a very powerful
narrative. You just have to read the book to experience it.
That's also the only way you're going to learn what the title
means.
You just have to realize it would probably be impossible to read
the book and not come to care about and want to do something to help
real life girls like Nawra. YOWZA!!!
On a personal note, today as I saw my younger daughter all dressed up
the start of another semester at University my heart was overflowing
with gratitude. She lives in a home with electricity and running
water. I had the food to prepare her a nourishing breakfast. She has
access to an education many of her peers around the world can only
dream of. She and I will know the safety of not having our nation
full or armies and rebel groups killing, raping, and burning anyone
and anything in their path. I will never take great good fortune like
that for granted.
A great big shout out goes out to Sylvia Whitman for this very
powerful and eloquent novel with its great potential to touch readers'
hearts and minds.
Julia Emily Hathaway


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