Amina lives on the edges of Mogadishu. Her family’s house has been damaged in Somalia’s long civil war, but they continue to live there, reluctant to leave their home. Amina’s world is shattered when government forces come to arrest her father because his art has been officially censored, deemed too political. Then rebel forces kidnap Amina’s brother, forcing him to become a soldier in Somalia’s brutal ongoing war. Although her mother and grandmother are still with her, Amina feels vulnerable and abandoned. Secretly, she begins to create her own artwork in the streets and the derelict buildings to give herself a sense of hope and to let out the burden of her heart.
- ISBN: 9781743312490
- Author: Powers, J. L.
- Published: 2013 , Allen & Unwin
- Themes: Art and artists, Censorship, child soldiers, civil war, Family, Kidnapping
- Descriptors: Realistic Fiction, Somalia, Young Adult (ages 14-18)
- No. of pages: 192