Africa

Materials from Africa

Kwajo And The Brassman’s Secret

A tale of old Ashanti wisdom and gold. Kwajo lives in Ghana. Ghana is country in West Africa. The Ashantis live here. Many years ago, Ashanti was a powerful kingdom. Ashanti is also very influential in Ghana today. The Ashantis were and are famous as courageous warriors, able merchants and artists, above all as woodcarvers, weavers, goldsmiths, drummers and dancers.Formerlyr, the Ashantis owned a lot of gold. They paid with gold dust. The gold dust was weighted on scales. The weights consisted of small, exquisite figurines. Every figurine represented someting different. These figurines were called gold weights and they were cast in bronze.

The Mzungu Boy

For Kariuki, life in a small village in Kenya is one great adventure. The best part of his day is the walk home from school, when he is free from both his bullying headmaster and his mother’s long list of chores. The landscape around his village is beautifully wild, and Kariuki knows it well. One day Kariuki meets Nigel, a boy from England who has come to visit his grandfather, the fearsome Bwana Ruin, who owns the farm where the villagers work. The villagers call Nigel the mzungu boy (westerner), and view him with suspicion and fear, but not Kariuki. One day the boys decide to hunt down the meanest warthog in the forest. The hunt takes them deeper into the jungle than Kariuki has ever gone, and all at once his beloved forest becomes a frightening place. Dangerous creatures live in the jungle, including the mau-mau, the men with guns who are plotting against Bwana Ruin and the white soldiers. And when Nigel suddenly disappears, will Kariuki be able to save his friend?In this novel, the author captures a time of innocence, wild beauty, and the growing violence that eventually changed the entire structure of colonial Africa.

Crazy Diamond

That’s Mira M. And this is the story of her unforgettable life — as a kid alone in a junkyard tire swing, to her escape from Croatia at age 9 in a Marshall amp road case in the rear of her uncle Lou’s van. A musician, he hands her the key to her future: a guitar. When she’s 14, Mira meets Melody, Rosa and Jackson, three teens who stow away from Ghana in a ship-ping container and end up — to their surprise — in Hamburg, Germany. What stories they have! And what a story the four of them, plus Kralle (a little older and wiser) and Zucka (the record producer’s son), share on the way to the fame that all of them covet — except Mira, even after the MTV Awards show in Barcelona. Her song lyrics tell her truth. But are they her lyrics? Her music? She swears so. But who listens, now that she’s 18 — and dead?

Voyage of Slaves

Adrift in the Mediterranean Sea, Ben falls captive to a band of slave traders and their leader Al Misurata. With his faithful dog Ned at his side, Ben must plot escape as the ship of scoundrels sails up the Libyan coastline toward Italy, where a trap awaits. Ruthless enemies and hard times appear around every bend, but Ben and Ned have quick wits to rely on and, just as important, one another.

Ring of the Slave Prince

Tom O’Connor, a poor, adventurous boy lives with his mother and half sister at a tavern on the island of Nevis in 1639. He rescues a slave from drowning, learns he is prince, loses him, travels the Southern Hemisphere in search of him, and finally brings him home to Cape Verde, hoping for a grand reward. But by the time Tom discovers that the prince is really a fisherman’s son, the loss of reward doesn’t matter-his adventures have brought him no use for greed, and as he says, “a reckless regard for other people’s life and well-being.”

The First Music

When the animals all get together in the jungle, they discover that the noise that they have been making is indeed music. Dylan Pritchett weaves a tale that helps us discover that we all have music inside just waiting to come out.

Forest of the Pygmies

Alexander Cold and Nadia Santos reunite for their final adventure in Isabel Allende’s celebrated trilogy. This time they are heading to the blazing plains of Kenya, where Alex’s grandmother Kate is writing an article about the first elephant-led safaris in Africa. Days into the tour, a Catholic missionary approaches the camp in search of companions who have mysteriously disappeared. As the group investigates, they discover a clan of Pygmies and a harsh world of corruption, slavery and poaching. Alexander and Nadia must trust in the strength of their totemic animal spirits as they launch a spectacular struggle to restore freedom to the Pygmies and return leadership to its rightful hands.