From: Kathleen Horning <horning>
Date: Fri, 12 Sep 2003 16:50:30 -0500

I also appreciate the novel "Habibi" as a portrait of a developing writer. Liyana has the heart and soul of a poet, and that influences everything she sees and feels.
 In a sense she would always be something of an outsider, no matter where she was living.

The relationship she had with her grandmother was especially moving, as I recall. It's interesting to compare this with the relationship between the grandmother and granddaughter that appear in "Sitti's Secrets," one of Naomi Nye's early picture books. In both books, the children are separated by both physical and cultural geography from their grandmothers, and yet there is such a sense of closeness conveyed.

KTH

Kathleen T. Horning, Director Cooperative Children's Book Center University of Wisconsin-School of Education 4290 Helen C. White Hall 600 North Park St. Madison, WI 53706

horning at education.wisc.edu Voice: 608&3721 Fax: 608&2I33 www.education.wisc.edu/ccbc/
Received on Fri 12 Sep 2003 04:50:30 PM CDT