Light It Up

Juvenile torn from headlines fiction 

"At the end of the day, a girl is dead.  Maybe it's winter.  Maybe she had a black ski hat on.  Maybe she was running and didn't stop when he ordered her to.  Maybe because she had headphones in, so she didn't hear him shouting.  Maybe she was late for something.  Or maybe she was running simply because it was cold, and she was nervous to be alone on the street."

     An unarmed thirteen-year-old Black girl is shot in the back by a white police officer.  It's not the first time a Black youth has been taken down in that neighborhood by what some euphemistically call an officer-involved shooting.  Tensions escalate as a grand jury deliberates on whether to indict the police officer.  White supremacists picket the child's funeral.

    In Light It Up Kekla Magoon brings a scenario all too common in today's America vividly to life by using a format that weds prose and play script with a smattering of free verse thrown in.  Members of a large ensemble cast takes turns sharing their perspectives.  Here are just a few of the ones readers will meet.

     Eva is the daughter of the shooter cop.  Tina is the best friend of the child, Shea, was killed.  She'd previously lost her brother to a cop with a gun.  In a two page spread they voice very different opinions on those entrusted with serving and protecting.  

Eva: "They don't flash their lights or anything, but the warmth of the red and blue covers us like a blanket anyway.  We are protected.  We are part of something bigger than any one of us."

Tina: "Momma says

the world will never take care of me.

Helpful people are there to help little white girls.

I am on my own."

     Witness is the first to see the dead child.  Even though he does nothing to threaten the cop he finds himself slammed to the ground, handcuffed, and hauled to the police station.  

     "You need time and space to clear your head.  You have a daughter, almost thirteen.

     Devante, Tyrell, and Robb are first year college students.  Robb is convinced he's woke but he is usually clueless, often saying that someone shot or arrested by a cop must have done something to instigate the incident.  Devante is his friend, mentally torn between loyalty to him and anger at his privileged not getting it.  Tyrell is the academic geek from the neighborhood that's the book setting who finds that math is an escape.  "Mental gymnastics is better than meditation for making the whole world disappear around me."

     Brick is a gang leader.  Zeke runs a community organization.  They have decidedly different tactics.  But as peril increases for the Black community you discover that they have a lot in common.

     Even Peach Street has a voice.

     "Signs flattened by footprints, dampened by dew and body fluids.  Tears, sweat, blood, urine.  This night has seen it all.  The dawn now bears its own witness."

     This book is a must acquire for school and public libraries.  It needs to be part of school curriculums.  It's great for teen, adult, and two generation book clubs.  

     The words need to be read out loud.  I'd suggest a readers' theater production incorporating some or all of the text..

     ...because it is lit.

Jules Hathaway 

      

Sent from my U.S.Cellular© Smartphone