Books give credibility to our experiences.
It’s one of the values of reading: seeing our own struggles reflected helps us know we are not alone.
Today I bring you two new books in which the authors address real life kid struggles. These are not every child’s struggles, thank goodness. But I am so glad there are books about the kids on the periphery; the ones struggling with homeless ness and mental health challenges.
Real Life Kid Struggles #1: Homelessness
No Fixed Address by Susin Nielsen is a powerful story of a boy and his single mother. This happens to tae place in Canada, but it could be anywhere. Mom (“Astrid”) loses her job, loses their apartment, falls prey to depression. She and her son Felix start “vacationing” in her boyfriend’s camper van. Soon they are simply living in it, hoping to find a job, to afford a place to live. Astrid tells Felix not to tell anyone. The lies pile up in the effort to stay under the radar and get by.
Miracle salvation plan…
The story has an engaging plot, including Felix’s love of a game show (sounds a bit like Jeopardy)—which he plans to enter and win so he can “save” his mom and himself from their desperate situation.
The weight, of course, comes as the realities of this real life kid struggle sink in. Yes, it is fictionalized, but it might as well be real. This book holds great power to help us understand and have compassion for those suffering homelessness.
Real Life Kid Struggles #2: Mental Health Challenges
The Dreamway by Lisa Papademetriou is a fantasy adventure. In it you travel the rails of “The Dreamway”—a sort of parallel Universe made from dreams and those tending/eliciting/managing them. Populated with fantastic characters like a talking mouse, a nervous dragonfly, and a mysterious pirate, it seems another fantastic tale…
But then you read the Author’s Note
I recommend starting with the Author’s Note (at the end of the book) instead of leaving it for last. It speaks to the author’s personal struggle with fear-driven obsessive-compulsive behavior as a latch-key kid.
This real information about the author puts the story in an entirely different light. The story becomes a metaphor. The Dreamway represents her own real life struggles as a kid.
Having fine stories about tough real life problems helps both kids and adults se them with greater understanding and compassion. These books give us a perspective from which it becomes more possible to help real life kids look out for each other. The books encourage honesty, and finding a trusted adult to confide in.
Neither of these books is an easy read.
But both authors have crafted engaging stories that open a way for more compassion, less hiding, less judgment, more problem-solving action.
Your library should have (or can order) both The Dreamway by Lisa Papademetriou and No Fixed Address by Susin Nielsen. Presenting real life kid struggles is a terrific value of books and of reading!