Away by Megan E Freeman

“For several months, the governor’s office and the Colorado Investigation Bureau have been monitoring a series of credible threats across Colorado. 

On Friday, we received intelligence of an imminent threat jeopardizing the safety of thousands of residents. We immediately launched a noncombatant evacuation operation named Operation Relocate Freedom. 

We do not know how long evacuations will last, and the state remains on emergency alert.”

Each section in this book begins with a definition such as this one:

There are four kids voices in this hybrid verse novel and Megan E Freeman makes it easy to keep up with each kids because they each use a different form of writing. The kids are Ashanti Johnson, aged 12, her mum is a doctor; Grandin Stone, aged 14 - his parents are farmers; Harmony Addams-Paul, aged 12 - she aspires to be a journalist, she has a fabulous teacher and mum her is a pastor; and Teddy Brenkert, aged 11 - he is homeschooled and lives with his grandmother who is a local amateur theatre producer. All of these kids live in Colardo. Ashanti and Grandin use free verse to tell their story; Teddy writes film proposals and scripts and often references famous classic movies and as you would expect Harmony writes as though her pieces are ready for publication in a newspaper. Then comes:

These four kids plus Harmony's little sister Pax, are thrown together when everyone in their area is evacuated due to some unexplained toxic danger. Along with many other people they are taken to a holding camp where they are given food and safety but no one is allowed to use a mobile phone, the authorities do not answer any questions and they are kept there for over two years!

“This is the Colorado National Guard. Mandatory evacuations are now in place for your area. Proceed immediately to designated embarkation zones for further instructions. Local law enforcement will provide additional guidance specific to your location. ... The specific cause of the evacuations is not yet known, but there are unconfirmed reports of a pipeline explosion, possibly multiple explosions. Sources at the state capitol say a major threat could be imminent, and terrorism has not been ruled out."

"Cell phones have been compromised and are not safe to use. As a matter of state security, all cell phones must be deposited in designated receptacles located throughout the station. Compliance is mandatory."

These kids all have talents which when combined are able to work out not just what is going on but also how to inform the adults and how to expose the conspiracy and they also luckily do find a few left-over pieces of technology which they are able to put to good use.

We are going to be muckrakers. Shine a light on what’s wrong in the world. ... Journalists who specifically investigate and report on stories to expose corruption or exploitation or other stuff like that. They rake the muck of society.

As you might expect there are lots of theories and rumors about why whole communities have been evacuated:

One girl said she’d heard a train carrying chemicals had derailed. Another heard there had been explosions in a mine shaft and a dam had broken. Someone else said a pipeline had burst. A kid from the Western Slope insisted “nonhuman biologics” were colonizing remote parts of the Rocky Mountains. One boy said his mom thought it was a nuclear accident, like the ones in Fukushima and Chernobyl. Do we even have nuclear reactors in Colorado? I have no idea.

Publisher blurb: After an imminent yet unnamed danger forces people across Colorado to leave their homes, a group of kids including an aspiring filmmaker and a budding journalist find themselves in the same evacuation camp. As they cope with the aftermath of having their world upended, they grow curious about the mysterious threat. And as they begin to investigate, they start to discover that there’s less truth and more cover-up to what they’re being told. Can they get to the root of the conspiracy, expose the bad actors, and bring an end to the upheaval before it’s too late?

Away is the companion volume to Alone - companion volume means while you do need to read BOTH books the order does not matter. 

Alone

In my review of Alone I said: I did want that all important happy ending but somehow the final three pages let me down. I wanted to know more. I need know why!

And now I do know why because I have read Away.

A couple of weeks ago I had a long ten-hour journey by bus, plane and train. It is always SO good when I have an engrossing and brilliantly constructed book like this to pass the time. I absolutely devoured Away. You can see I have given Away five stars but I do agree with Kirkus who say: The plot and the whole scenario require a major suspension of disbelief, but to readers who can roll with it, Freeman delivers an engaging tale in which young crusaders strive to overcome both parental passivity and corrupt authorities to discover and expose a dastardly scheme.

Here is a long interview with Megan E Freeman where she talks about Away and Alone. You can either listen or read the transcript. 

Awards for Away:

• Instant New York Times Bestseller ​
• Barnes & Noble Best Book of 2025
• Amazon Best Book of 2025
• Barnes & Noble Children's Book Award Shortlist
• Golden Kite Award Finalist
• Reading the West Awards Shortlist
• TOME Society Junior Book Award Winner
• KNEA Reading Circle Choice for 2025
• Colorado Children's Book Award Shortlist
• Horace Mann Upstanders Award

This unique story is about friendship, survival, and how curiosity can lead to revelations, and the power of hope. Away was hard to put down because you need to know what is happening and why. Youth Services Book Review

The voices of the different characters are all very unique, and they are easy to tell apart. ... This is a good choice for readers who like dystopian books ...

The voices of the different characters are all very unique, and they are easy to tell apart. Ashantae doesn't use capitalization and references lots of mythology, Grandin is very matter-of-fact, Teddy often frames scenes as storyboards or film scripts, and Harmony's point of view is delivered in letters or news reports. The evacuation is realistically portrayed; if someone came to my door and told me I had to leave, and I saw all of my neighbors packing up, I probably would, too. Camp Rogers slowly evolves over the long time that people are there, with everyone pitching in to help out. ... This is very different from Alone, but readers who picked up that story will find it interesting to see what the experience of others who were not abandoned was. Ms Yingling

We are Water Protectors by Carole Lindstrom illustrated by Michaela Goade

"We fight for those

who cannot fight for themselves

The winged ones.

The crawling ones."

"In Ojibwe culture, women are protectors of the water and men are protectors of the fire."

This story deals with a specific threat to water by an oil pipeline but it also contains an important message about the care we all need to take of our precious environment. Here in Australia you could use this book for a unit about water, the environment, or with older students as a way to talk about other indigenous cultures. This book also links with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 6 - Clean water and sanitation. 

From the author web page: Water is the first medicine. It affects and connects us all… When a black snake threatens to destroy the Earth and poison her people’s water, one young water protector takes a stand to defend Earth’s most sacred resource. Inspired by the many indigenous-led movements across North America, this bold and lyrical picture book issues an urgent rallying cry to safeguard the Earth’s water from harm and corruption.

Water is the first medicine.

It affects and connects us all.

Water is sacred.

My people talk of a black snake that will destroy the land,

Spoil the water, wreck everything in its path.

They foretold that it wouldn't come for many, many years.

Now the black snake is here.

Here is a set of teachers notes. 

An inspiring call to action for all who care about our interconnected planet. Kirkus Star review

A young Sioux girl recalls the story her grandmother told, featuring the dire warning that a black snake would come, contaminating the water source, thus causing harm to all the animals and land. The young girl decides to take a stand in order to protect the water sources and provide safety for all living things. The “black snake” a.k.a. the pipeline. While this is a simple story, there is more to it than meets the summary. The black snake? It’s really an oil pipeline. Raising Real Readers

We are Water Protectors won the Caldecott Medal in 2021. The criteria for the Caldecott emphasise the importance of the illustrators and in We are Water Protectors the illustrators are truly special. 

About the Caldecott Medal:

• The Medal shall be awarded annually to the artist of the most distinguished American picture book for children published by an American publisher in the United States in English during the preceding year. There are no limitations as to the character of the picture book except that the illustrations be original work.
• A “picture book for children” as distinguished from other books with illustrations, is one that essentially provides the child with a visual experience. A picture book has a collective unity of story-line, theme, or concept, developed through the series of pictures of which the book is comprised.
• A “picture book for children” is one for which children are an intended potential audience. The book displays respect for children’s understandings, abilities, and appreciations. Children are defined as persons of ages up to and including fourteen and picture books for this entire age range are to be considered.

Stickboy by Rebecca Young illustrated by Matt Ottley

"Stickboy lived in wind and dust, where ancient rock loomed like waves waiting to break. Dust storms raged, pummeling the earth and stone while warm bodies huddled under cover willing the roar to fade."

This is one of those books where I would be tempted to share the spare text with no reference to the illustrations on a first reading with a group in a library. Then I would just let the children sit quietly giving them time to let their imaginations fly. Finally, I would share the book with the illustrations by Matt Ottley. This is one of those picture books (we do them very well here in Australia) that will work best with older students aged 10+. And do take time to linger over the end papers - different front and back. 

Stickboy has been selected as a 2025 CBCA Picture Book Notable title. I imagine it has a good chance to make the final short list of six titles announced at the end of March. 

Here are two Teacher-Librarians discussing how this book might fit into the curriculum (12 minutes). Here are the Scholastic Teachers Notes (shared by Pegi Williams). 

... the potential for exploring parts of storytelling like visual features, figurative language, perspective and allegory is immense. On each page amidst the dry rock formations, for example, there is a nod to water elements – clouds like seafoam, a rock face like the bow of a ship. There is a discussion to be had about listening to the Earth and who might be positioned as a truth teller when it comes to environmental awareness. Story Links

The last spreads are wordless and say so much more than any words ever could. They are hauntingly beautiful. The colour palette reflects the bare and barren place perfectly. The reader’s eye is immediately drawn to certain images on each spread that enhance the storytelling. For example, Sometimes the earth creaked and shifted... and swallowed memories, whole. On the double spread Ottley has a huge metal ship that sits on a dry parched land and Stickboy and a wolf are small. The text gives Ottley room to shine his masterful visual storytelling. The images are allowed to speak and are not crowded by text. This picture book allows both the words and images to speak on so many levels to the reader as they seamlessly work together. Ottley’s use of light and shade dramatizes the story and the moments that are poignant. Buzz Words

Matt Ottley is a multi-modal artist working across visual arts, music and literature. He is an award-winning picture book writer and illustrator with over 25 picture books published.  Ottley has written music for this book that will be recorded in Prague and this work will become the eleventh in his Sound of Picture series. It will be performed in Australia in 2025.Matt Ottley was our IBBY Australia Hans Christian Andersen Award Nominee illustrator for 2024. You should also share this book alongside other books illustrated by Matt Ottley:

Teacup

How to make a bird

You can see other books by Rebecca Young here. 

Companion book:

Water is Water by Miranda Paul illustrated by Jason Chin

Here is a strange suggestion - do not read the words in this book when you pick it up for the first time. Just turn the pages slowly and enjoy the scrumptious illustrations and do not skip past the first page, the title page and the dedication page. As you move through the story you will notice the seasonal changes and way these children embrace their outdoor environment. 

You can see nearly every page from this book here. 

Now go back and read the lyrical text. Miranda Paul has incorporated all aspects of the water cycle into a very satisfying narrative. This book is a science lesson but it absolutely does not feel like one. All of the water 'facts' are reserved for the final pages along with a further reading list.

"Puddles are puddles unless ... puddles freeze. Glide. Slide. Put on the brakes! Ice is ice unless ... it forms flakes."

If you have an audible subscription the audio version of Water is Water is well worth exploring. Here is the website for Miranda Paul. Check out my previous post. Scroll down through this site to find teaching resources for Water is Water. 

Chin’s realistic watercolor-and-gouache illustrations offer repeat readers seemingly endless new details, like the brother’s propensity for finding small animals with which to torment his sister. ... An engaging and lyrical look at the water cycle. Kirkus

Water is Water exemplifies how a complex subject shared through story engages the child, leap frogs all the diagrams and other didactics, and goes straight to the brain! Rather than “following the drop,” as many water cycle books do, this one analogously follows the constant motion of children, each on their own unique path. The children play and explore finding their relationship with nature – joining in as the natural story unfolds around them. Paul and Chin bring home to their readers a story of enormous proportions, one that is largely invisible to all of us, by focusing on children doing what they do outdoors. Brilliant! Montessori Images

Companion books:

Water can Be

Hey Water

Summer Blue

I have a huge 'want to read' collection on Pinterest. In a moment of enormous generosity my friend from Kinderbookswitheverything hunted out a heap of these titles from her library for me to borrow over the summer. Water is Water was one of those titles.  Water is Water is still in print but sadly it is way too expensive for school libraries here in Australia. 

Jason Chin is an award-winning illustrator. Here in Australia very few libraries hold copies of his Caldecott winner - Watercress - but is a book I really want to explore more closely. 

Thirst by Varska Bajaj

If you plan to book talk this book with your students, I suggest you begin with the cover. Try to put this image up on a big screen and then look closely at all the details. We see a young girl in a school uniform holding two large clay jugs. She is looking at a ramshackle city of makeshift buildings but there is also a high-rise apartment tower in the distance. We cannot see the girl's face but the way she is standing seems to imply emotion and longing. Notice the extra words on the cover too - "Imagine a world where water is for everyone ..."  Surely that will shock your students and generate some good discussion. Colby Sharp suggests you then try to find images of modern-day Mumbai with your students so they can see the juxtaposition of high-rise buildings and the shanty towns beside them. Here is one I found. 

Minni lives in Mumbai and every day is a struggle for her family. Water is not readily available. Every day adults and children have to till their containers at communal taps and often the water only comes through as a trickle. Worse, this water is contaminated and so it is essential to boil and filter it before drinking. Minni's mum became quite ill last year from drinking the water.

Mumbai is a city of rich and the desperately poor. The rich have taps that provide cold and hot water in their own homes - they even have swimming pools filled with water. 

The monsoon is late and water is becoming even more difficult to obtain. Then Minni, her brother and another young friend witness someone stealing water - taking this precious resource with the intention to sell it to the poor of the city at highly inflated prices. Her brother and his friend have been seen by the criminals so they are whisked away to safety far from the city. Then Minni's mother becomes very ill and so she leaves to recover in the home of her sister - also far away. Minni's mother works as a servant to a rich family in one of those high-rise apartments. Her mother needs this work and so Minni is sent in her place. You will gasp with Minni when she steps inside the luxury apartment and sees carpet, and water, and possessions beyond her wildest imagination. After working for the family for many weeks, the rich father arrives home one evening. Minni only glimpsed the men stealing the water, but she recognises him straight away. How can young kids convince the authorities that they have found the water thieves - the water mafia?

This is a fairly short novel with 179 pages but it is such a powerful story. Readers will hopefully gain and understanding of life in other places and feel enormous empathy towards young Minni. It might also give them a small insight into the importance of education as a way to move out of poverty. Here is the webpage of the author. Be sure to read the "about me" section. I highly recommend Thirst - you should add this to your Primary library wish list. 

In this poignant, relatable work, Bajaj expertly depicts class and wealth differences; Minni’s worries for her mother and anger at the injustices inflicted on her community are especially moving. Kirkus

Colby Sharp - awesome, heartbreaking, read this book!

Thirst was a 2022 Global Read Aloud book. 

Here is a video of Chapter One.

Awars for Thirst:

• Texas Bluebonnet Master list 2023-2024
• Amazon Best Books of 2022
• Cynsations Best books of 2022
• Cybils 2022 Middle Grade Fiction Finalist
• Global Read Aloud, Middle Grade selection for 2022
• Junior Library Guild Gold Standard selection

Companion books

Ajay and the Mumbai Sun

Ajay and the Jaipur Moon

A Long Walk to Water

The Paper House

Paradise Sands by Levi Pinfold

"White roses we follow, towards Teller's Hollow

Dead earth to a spring, the house of a King

A sip from the chalice, we enter his palace

Break bread for the Keeper now we descend deeper

Washed clean in his pool we fall under his rule

Away from what is, we all now are his"

These children/adolescents have clearly heard the opening six-line rhyme recited by their mother many times but instead of listening to the words and recognising they are warning or a prophecy, the words have become a little like a jingle that they sing along to in their car. Only the young girl knows there are warnings in these words. 

This is a story of enchantment, entrapment, courage, wisdom, patience, belief, temptation and above all love. The young girl will rescue her brothers no matter what the personal cost rather like the girl in the Wild Swans fairy tale. Water is an important underlying theme here too. The landscape is a desert but there is water in this mysterious place. The boys are eager to jump in cool water of the pool. Then we don’t see the boys again once the Teller issues his challenge. For three days the girl does not drink. Her body language shows her determination to succeed against The Teller. But I felt such shock when her act of compassion towards the flowers, when she gives them a drink, has unexpected and dire consequences. 

The sepia hyper realistic art with touches of blue and pink are reminiscent of art by Chris van Allsburg, Shaun Tan and Steven Woolman (The Watertower). 

This story has biblical overtones, it feels like a parable, and it has references to fairy tales such as Beauty and the Beast. Notice the repeated pattern of three – three days, three broken columns, three banquet scene, three brothers and three dolphins. The setting and time period are open-ended although we do recognise this is an older model car and the cinder blocks on the house also hint at a time from the recent past.

Right from the beginning the young girl, in her pale blue dress, shows she has a higher level of responsibility. Think about how she stops to lock the door to their house. 

Take a close look at the cover: golden fruit (Adam and Eve perhaps); the shadow of the girl is cut in half; the young girl wears blue dress does this signify innocence? I thought of the phrase - "the little child shall lead them”. There is a chalice in the corner of the cover. I associate this with the ceremony in a church where wine is shared during communion to represent the blood of Christ. The girl looks sad, and her gaze is directed toward the towering lion. He also looks sad or even perhaps resigned. 

Looking at the dust jacket the image stretches out and the face of the lion looks strangely like the face of a man in profile. The three pages where we see the banquet table are very interesting. On the first we have domestic animals eating human food. The next day, enormous exotic animals arrive. On the third day, though, the food is all gone, and the crows have arrived – do they symbolise death? Is the lion an echo of Aslan? Is this about free will? The dry remote forbidding landscape in this book is also a character. There are so many interesting shadows and sharp angles in the illustrations. 

Readers will have so many questions and they will be eager to revisit the story and illustrations. Have the children visited their mother before; where and what is this hospital; and did the meeting with The Teller and his dreadful bargain also happen to their mother in the past? So, the ending is bittersweet as the girl both succeeds and fails. 

If you are sharing this book with a group of High School students you could consider exploring these possible references - a painting of the Last Supper; fairy tales such as Beauty & the Beast, Hansel and Gretel and The Wild Swans. You might thing about Orpheus in the Underworld and classic literature such as Aslan from the Narnia books. Thinking about pop culture you could relate this story to music or television such as 'Don't pay the Ferryman', 'Hotel California', 'Breaking Bad' (the desert setting), 'Game of Thrones' (Ziggurat type building). 

Every part of this book design has been created with care. There is a different image under the dust jacket. The end papers are the same blue as the girl's dress. 

Paradise Sands is a CBCA (Children's Book Council of Australia) Honour Book. Here is the report from the judges (I was one for this round):

Right from the beginning, the young girl, in her pale blue dress, shows she has a higher level of responsibility. The characters have clearly heard the opening six-line rhyme many times, but instead of recognising they are a warning, the words have become a jingle they sing along to in their car. This is a story of enchantment, entrapment, courage, wisdom, patience, belief, temptation and, above all, love. The young girl will rescue her brothers no matter what the personal cost. An almost unbearable sense of bleakness is created through the dry barren landscapes and even the starkness of the house and hospital room. The landscape in this book becomes a character. Older readers will be eager to revisit the story and the exquisite, masterful illustrations. This book has the look and feel of a classic.

In her post on her blog Paperbark Words Joy Lawn gives some excellent suggestions for ways to explore this book with your older students. I would say this book is for mature readers aged 11 and that it should be added to every High School library. Read this interview where Levi Pinfold talks with Kirkus. See some of the art from this book and here are some review comments:

This one has all the hallmarks of a book that someone will buy for a child, the child will read and reread for years, and it’ll embed itself in the deepest folds and crevices of that child’s brain. ... If you need something beautiful and odd to give to a child, you could hardly do better than this. Betsy Bird Fuse 8

This is a truly eerie tale with much left for the reader to ponder upon. Pinfold’s illustrations are mesmerising, unsettling and haunting, drawing us to them again and again in search of further meanings. Red Reading Hub

The meticulous nature of Pinfold's art lures the reader's eye to the tiniest illustrative details, such as the texture of the Teller's mane, dirt-caked fissures in the marble columns and the girl's heartbreaking and resigned facial expressions. Cool blue endpapers stand in stark contrast to the leathery dryness of the sepia palette dominating this stunning and heavily symbolic story. Shelf Awareness

This mesmerizing work offers potential jumping-off points to discuss many topics, including magical realism, symbolism, family relationships and roles, and mental health. Kirkus star review

The washout-desert palette in the hauntingly beautiful realistic mixed-media illustrations creates an eerie sense of foreboding (carried through to the ambiguous ending) that cues readers into the otherworldliness of the story. Horn Book star review

This book has been added to the NCACL database of Picture Books for Older Readers. I highly recommend you explore this resource.

Companion books:

Meet the illustrator Antoinette Portis

Hey, Water!

A New Green Day

Antoinette Portis is an award winning US author and illustrator. Antoinette made her picture-book debut with the New York Times best-selling Not A Box, an American Library Association Seuss Geisel Honor book, and one of the New York Times Ten Best Illustrated Books of the Year. She was a recipient of the 2010 Sendak Fellowship. 

I borrowed Now from a school library this week.  This library add a little sticker to their books if they are special favourites - they call them "Our Picks". I love this idea and always feel a little thrill when I borrow a book with one of those stickers.

Portis perfectly captures how children experience the world, the immediacy and magic of it all; exuberant and quiet, simple and complex, and extremely satisfying. Kirkus Star review

This is my favourite breeze.

This is my favourite leaf.

This is my favourite hole (this one) because it's the one I am digging.

This is my favourite mud. This is my favourite worm.

That is my favourite cloud because it's the one I am watching.

The structure of this text reads like a poem and in poetry every word is so carefully selected and placed. With young children you could use each page of this book as a discussion starter and with older children you could use this text as a model for writing. It would also be terrific to discuss the cover design - half the face on the front with the huge leaf and half when you stretch the book out.

I would pair this with another book by Antoinette Portis - Wait. 

Beautifully controlled pacing and an immensely satisfying rainbow resolution make this book an effective refutation of frenzied schedules. Kirkus Star review

Hey, Water! by Antoinette Portis

Hey, water! I know you! You're all around. 

This is a simply perfect book to share with your youngest child or a preschool group. Every form of water is covered in this book but with an incredibly spare text and very appealing illustrations.

Image source: Antoinette Portis

Here are a few more examples - each line here is on one page:

Sprinkler You spray up

and down. Shower

...

You cover most of the earth - salty, surging, and mysterious. Ocean

...

In the morning, you wink at me from blades of grass. dewdrop

Look at how she made the dewdrop ever so slightly translucent, all with her brushwork. A book that has had care and time poured into its pages exudes that love when you read it. There is not a drop of paint or a flick of a brush out of place here. ...And maybe, just maybe, some little kid out there will read this book and, for whatever reason, love it dearly. Hey, Portis! You made a really good book. Betsy Bird SLJ

The illustrations are "are very simple but effective and convey the movement and the texture of the water in its various guises." Reading Time

Take a look at this Horn Book Review too. There are videos of this book but I suggest the book itself is a way better way to share this book. Note in US editions the first page says faucet not tap!

This is a book that should be added to every preschool and infants school library. 

Awards for this book:

• 2020 ALSC Robert F. Sibert Honor book

• A 2020 American Library Assn. Notable Book

• New York Public Library, Best Books for Kids 2019

• Chicago Public Library, Best Informational Books for Younger Readers of 2019

• A 2020 Bank Street Coll. of Education Best Children's Book of the Year

• Nerdy Book Club, 2019 Nerdy Award for non-fiction picture book

• A Mighty Girl’s 2019 Books of the Year

Take a look at another post on this blog about books by Antoinette Portis. 

Too Small Tola by Atinuke

Atinuke has crafted another gem. A small story about a small girl set in a city and country possibly very unfamiliar to most readers. A small story with a HUGE heart. 

"Tola lives in a run-down block of flats in the megacity of Lagos, in the country of Nigeria. She lives with her sister Moji, who is very clever; her brother Dapo, who is very fast and Grandmummy who is very-very bossy."

"Sometimes the electricity words. And sometimes it does not. Sometimes the water runs. And sometimes it does not. Once the lift worked. And now it definitely does not."

There are three short stories in Too Small Tola. All of them would make a terrific class read aloud for a Grade One or Grade Two class but I especially love the final story where little Tola takes on a big responsibility.  Easter is coming and it is nearly the end of Ramadan. People are preparing for the festival of Eid which this year coincides with Easter. Tola and her neighbours do not have much money but they always have new clothes made to wear for Easter Sunday. Tola may be small but she loves maths and she loves numbers and she is skilled with measuring. Mr Abdul, the local tailor, has a bad bicycle accident. Tola, with help from her brother Dapo, take over riding around the city collecting orders and taking those all important measurements. Mr Abdul is a wonderful man. He knows just how to make every one feel terrific even Dapo who is at first very reluctant to help. 

Too Small Tola is the first book in a planned series.  

The setting for Too Small Tola is Nigeria. Kids Book A Day blogger Janet Dawson talked about this book today and she made the comment:

 I was really hoping for a bit of backmatter on Lagos and Nigeria–at least a map.

So I found some maps:

Too Small Tola is a wonderfully warm read. Warm, heartfelt and super lovely. What a brilliant start to a brand new series! My Book Corner

this is a smashing chapter book for newly confident readers. Red Reading Hub

Through the young girl’s experiences, children will learn about life in Lagos, from the bumper-to-bumper traffic on hot, dusty roads to the stark contrast between rich and poor. Readers will also identify with Tola’s universal concerns, such as sibling tensions and facing up to bullies. Book Trust

Can I suggest you visit your school library today to look for other books by Atinuke. These are books that should be part of every primary school library and they should be shared widely.