Red Sand Blue Sky (Girls First!)

My 6th grade daughter said she "loved it" and it was "full of adventure". Pleasing words for a mother to hear. It tied in well with the Australia unit studied in school and an aboriginal art project.I read through some of the book myself to get a feel for it. The vocab and storytelling was good, but be aware that the story line would be a good made-for-tv Disney movie.

This book was recommended as part of our history curriculum. I had no idea when I ordered it through our library that it is now printed by the Feminist Press. It suddenly makes sense that most of the characters are female and rarely portrayed in a negative light while the main "bad" guys are men. The pagan religion is presented as truth. In fact, the main character seems to become a believer when she hears spirits and sees her dead mom at a sacred site. Ironically, for a book that battles against prejudice, this one carries it's own brand. At the end, the main character looks down her nose at her rich neighbors simply for being rich. What?? Maybe she should get to know them before judging? The little bit of factual information incorporated is not worth reading the book, in our opinion.

I started reading this book aloud to my daughter, who is adopted. Initially, I thought that the main character, Amy, not having a mother --explanations given later in the story as to why--and Lana not having a mother would be something that would resonate with my daughter. There were idioms from Australia that we enjoyed looking up in our large Webster's International Dictionary.I read only three chapters to my daughter and then finished reading it to myself. One does learn about living in the areas near Alice Springs and the differences in life experiences between a middle-upper class girl from Melbourne and an Aboriginal girl from a small unincorporated area somewhere near Alice Springs, but the story quickly devolves into the grievances that the Aboriginal peoples have with the "whitefellas" and some very stereotypical characters emerge. I want to learn and want my daughter to learn about the Aboriginal peoples of Australia, but there has got to be a memoir out there that is "more messy" than this story is.All is somewhat "tidy" in the end.As adopting a child from a foreign country at age 7 is not "tidy", I want her to know that issues such as the Aboriginal peoples experience and developing friendships is not all that tidy all the time either.I don't recommend this book. The spiritual aspects of the story are glossed over and one gets no sense that Amy has any view of God and that Lana clings to her traditions which I felt we were subtly encouraged to view as just as true as any other spiritual beliefs. While I have no problem with a book talking about the spiritual beliefs of other peoples, the onus is on the parent to explain why we believe the way we do.If your child reads this alone, be aware that there is no "truth" expounded; only ideas that are regarded as just as valid as other ideas.

Through the eyes of children we learn that we are all human, despite colour, religious, cultural and political differences.