Ju ve n ile Non f ic t ion 8 5
The People Could Fly: The Picture Book by Virginia Hamilton
J 398.208 HAMILTON
This story is a simplified version, i.e. one in picture book form, of Ms. Hamilton’s earlier book of the same title. The book won a Coretta Scott King award for themes of non-violent social change, peace and brotherhood. The story begins in an unnamed country in Africa where there were those who could fly in the air on long, black wings. But then the slave trade came to their country and they lost their wings when captured (but not their power to fly!). The story then shifts to two of those that once had wings; a young mother named Sarah and an old man called Toby. When Sarah is beaten for slowing in her work and her baby cries, Toby helps her to remember the way to fly and she takes off with her child. Nor is she the only one; with Toby’s help, several men, women and children take off flying, including finally Toby himself. I have always regarded this story as a unique what-if of slavery times. It is designed as an oral tradition story put down on paper, and illustrated by Leo and Diane Dillon, the same pair that wrote the book Jazz on a Saturday Night. This fact makes it yet another way in which this book is a very good read. – Laurel Jones