A Girl Named Disaster

by Nancy Farmer

Overview

Orchard Classics is a collectible hardcover line of Newbery award-winning titles from the Orchard backlist that have fresh, beautiful new designs and include author prefaces and discussion guides.A GIRL NAMED DISASTER is the humorous and heartwrenching story of young girl who discovers her own courage and strength when she makes the dangerous journey from Mozambique to Zimbabwe. Nhamo is a Shona girl living in a traditional village in Mozambique in 1981. When her family tries to force her into a marriage with a cruel man, she flees. What was supposed to have been a short boat trip across the border into Zimbabwe, where she hoped to find her father, turns into an adventure filled with challenges and danger that lasts a year.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780545229784
Publisher:	Scholastic, Inc.
Publication date:	02/01/2010
Sold by:	Scholastic, Inc.
Format:	eBook
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	880,291
Lexile:	730L (what's this?)
File size:	804 KB
Age Range:	9 - 12 Years

About the Author

Before becoming a writer, Nancy Farmer lived in Africa, and her work there included monitoring water weeds in Mozambique and helping to control tsetse flies in Zimbabwe. Since then, she has earned a host of prestigious awards for her writing, including three Newbery Honors for THE EAR, THE EYE AND THE ARM; A GIRL NAMED DISASTER; and THE HOUSE OF THE SCORPION. She lives in Menlo Park, California, with her husband. Visit her online at www.nancyfarmerwebsite.com.

Hometown:

Menlo Park, California

Date of Birth:

July 9, 1941

Place of Birth:

Phoenix, Arizona

Education:

B.A., Reed College, 1963

Editorial Reviews

This 1997 Newbery Honor book, which is set in Africa, is both a survival story and a spiritual voyage. "[The heroine] is a stunning creationwhile she serves as a fictional ambassador from a foreign culture, she is supremely human. An unforgettable work," said PW in a starred review. Ages 10-14. (Mar.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Gr 6-9For Nhamo, an 11-year-old Shona girl living in Mozambique in 1981, life is filled with the traditions of her village people. When family circumstances, a ngozi (angry spirit), and a cholera epidemic force her into a horrible marriage, she flees with only her grandmother's blessings, some gold nuggets, and many survival skills. Still, what should have been a two-day boat trip across the border to her father's family in Zimbabwe spans a year. Daily conversations with spirits help to combat her loneliness and provide her with sage and practical advice. The most incredible leg of her journey is spent on an island where Nhamo closely observes and is warily accepted by a baboon family only to have one of them destroy her shelter and food supply. She makes mistakes, loses heart, and nearly dies of starvation. Even after she arrives in Zimbabwe where she lives with scientists before meeting her father's family, Nhamo must learn to survive in civilization and exorcise the demons that haunt her. A cast of characters, glossary, background information on South Africa and the Shona, and a bibliography ground this novel's details and culture. This story is humorous and heartwrenching, complex and multilayered, and the fortunate child who reads it will place Nhamo alongside Zia (Island of the Dolphins) and Julie (Julie of the Wolves). An engrossing and memorable saga.Susan Pine, New York Public Library

School Library Journal

Farmer (Runnery Granary, p. 300, etc.) plunges readers deep into South African social and spiritual worlds in this tale of a Shona girl fleeing an arranged marriage.

When the muvuki, the witchfinder, declares that Nhamo must marry an unsavory stranger to propitiate a murder victim's spirit, Nhamo gathers her few possessions and steals away in the village's only boat, intending to float up the Musengezi to Zimbabwe and find the father she's never known. It's a perilous journey that tests every ounce of her strength, will, and ingenuity: She has to find food in seasons fat and lean, cope with loneliness, face threats from everything from (elusive, perhaps metaphysical) leopards to land mines. Gathering discorporate (imaginary? not to her) companions as she goes, Nhamo lives in and off the wild for months, ending up at last, after finding her father's grave and enduring a cold reception from his family, with the congenial scientists at a tsetse fly research station. Although Farmer describes the history and culture of the Shona and other groups in an afterword, she hardly needs to; the cultural backdrop is so skillfully developed in her protagonist's experiences and responses that it will seem as understandable—or, in the case of European and Christian practices, as strange—and immediate to readers as it is to Nhamo. This wonderfully resourceful young woman is surrounded by an equally lively, colorful cast, and by removing many of the borders between human and animal, living and dead, Farmer creates a milieu as vivid and credible as readers' own. As rewarding, and as challenging, as The Ear, the Eye, and the Arm (1994).

Kirkus Reviews

* "An unforgettable work." —PUBLISHERS WEEKLY, starred review* "Rewarding." —KIRKUS, starred review* "This story is humorous and heart wrenching, complex and multilayered. . . . An engrossing and memorable saga." —SCHOOL LIBRARY JOURNAL, starred review

From the Publisher

Eleven-year-old Nhamo invites young listeners to share her adventures in the wilds of Africa as she flees from her village and a planned marriage to a cruel stranger. Along the way, as Nhamo blossoms into a self-assured young woman, listeners grow with her as they gain a new perspective on the rich cultural diversity present in this world. Narrator Lisette Lecat entices audio-travelers to accompany Nhamo on her journey in a masterful reading. Her English accent and easy characterization make the cross-cultural experience even more compelling. Through Lecat’s delightful narration, this newest book by a Newbery Award-winning author will not only entertain listeners, but encourage them to value cultural differences. P.H.N. ©AudioFile, Portland, Maine

MAY 98 - AudioFile