Tender Earth
by Sita Brahmachari
Publisher – Macmillan Children’s Books
Release Date – June 1st 2017
Buy – Amazon | Book DepositoryLaila Levenson has always been the baby of the family, but now with her older siblings, Mira and Krish, leaving home just as she starts secondary school, everything feels like it’s changing… can the reappearance of Nana Josie’s Protest Book and the spirit it releases in Laila, her friends and her local community, help her find her own voice and discover what she truly believes in?
A powerful chime rings through Laila’s mind, guiding her to walk the footsteps of the past on her way to discover her own future.
endorsed by Amnesty International UK because ‘it illuminates the importance of
equality, friendship and solidarity, and upholds our right to protest
against injustice.’
JUST WANT TO HAVE FUN-
HUMAN RIGHTS
AM A MUSLIM WOMAN
AM THIRTEEN YEARS OLD
WAS TWELVE WHEN SHE CHANGED THE WORLD
OLD WILL YOU BE?
EQUALITY
OLD TO MARCH
TO PROTEST
HANDS OFF
Tender Earth celebrates the power of young women to stand up against injustice. As I write I think about all the young women and men and their families who have been attacked recently in Manchester. Those whose lives were cut short because of hate. I have written this poem in their honour, and it links to some of the things that Laila Levenson and her friends have to face in Tender Earth. Like many of my fellow authors I hope my stories will have a positive impact on young readers:
Let not this fill your hearts with hate
Let not this stop you dancing, singing, playing
This earth on which you lay your flowers of loss
is bruised and tender
The willow weeps
But still it grows in splendour
Underneath these concrete paths
Rivers flow
Entwined our branches far and wide
Drawing water from deep courses
All flowing to a human sea
Make it not poisoned
Drink from the earth with love not hate
Let not this stop you dancing, singing, laughing, playing
Protest, stand up, speak out!
Sit together in candle light
Find comfort in each other
Tender Earth is told through the eyes of Laila Levenson. She and her friends are searching to find themselves a place and voice in the world. Laila is becoming conscious of the inequalities that exist between men and women. Like the rest of us, she has heard the kind of things that world leaders have said about the rights of women and during the course of the novel she is becoming conscious that the right of girls to be educated, to be in control of their own bodies, their legal rights, their right to express themselves, are all far from equal.
When Laila learns that the first march her Nana Josie ever went on was a Women’s March, it sparks her imagination, and there are plenty of things that happen to Laila and her friends in Tender Earth that make her understand why her Nana will never forget her Women’s March.
Mrs Latif, Laila’s inspirational teacher gives her I am Malala to read. This is what Laila writes in her reading record at school after she has read it:
I’m sitting in my uniform at my desk, filling in my reading record.
Themes: A girl can change an unfair world. Adults should listen to children. Adults should protect children. All children should have access to education. Children can see what bad things adults do. Children can change the world.
Comments: This is the best book I have ever read. One day I would like to meet Malala Yousafzai.
My favourite quotes:
“One child, one teacher, one book, one pen can change the world.”
“When the whole world is silent, even one voice becomes powerful.”
There are many powerful women characters in Laila’s past and present who guide her to become the person we see her growing into in Tender Earth.
Take a look at these links that I explored in my research… convert thought into action and, as soon as you are legally able to, VOTE for what you believe in.
This video clip from #BlackLivesMatter seems to speak to something at the core of Tender Earth where one generation of empathetic women seeks to hand over the baton to another.
https://twitter.com/womensmarch/status/831931108250046477/video/1
https://debatemate.com/
http://www.marieclaire.co.uk/reports/why-women-march-467043
Look up @womensmarch on Twitter
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/mar/29/fifth-wave-feminists-young-activists
Sita was born in Derby in 1966, to an Indian doctor from Kolkata and an English nurse from the Lake District. She has a BA in English Literature and an MA in Arts Education. Her many projects and writing commissions have been produced in theatres, universities, schools and community groups throughout Britain and America. ARTICHOKE HEARTS is her first novel for young people. Sita lives and works in North London with her husband, three children and a temperamental cat.
This is quite a powerful guest post and I’m honoured to be part of the tour to share it. I can’t wait to read this book too. Please go a head a take a look at this one, and make sure to follow the tour around too.
