WOW Review: Volume XVI, Issue 1 • Page 8 of 11 • Worlds of Words

Me and My Fear
Written and illustrated by Francesca Sanna
Flying Eye Books, 2018, 36 pp
ISBN: 978-1911171539

In Me and My Fear, readers are reintroduced to the young girl who fled her country because of war in the award-winning book The Journey (2016). She has now moved to a new country with her family and her secret friend called “Fear.” Francesca Sanna personifies the emotion of fear, picturing it as a white, soft, cloud-like person and positioning it as the young girl’s best friend. Originally smaller than the girl, Fear always does a good job of protecting the girl from dangerous things when the two of them go on adventures together. However, ever since moving to a new country, Fear has grown significantly. With the daunting task of moving to a new country, going to a new school, making new friends, and learning a different language, Fear has grown so much that it begins to isolate her. Fear tells her lies, saying no one likes her and that she should just stay by herself.

However, one day a boy in the class holds out a picture he made, inviting the girl to draw and paint together. Fear begins to shrink as the young girl creates art with her new friend and agrees to play with him at recess. While playing together, a dog barks and the boy hides behind his own personified emotion of fear. The young girl then notices that everyone else has a fear just like her’s; she is not the only one who experiences times of overwhelming fear. As time goes on, the girl’s Fear gets smaller and smaller in size. She learns that while fear is a normal emotion that can protect, she should never let it get in the way of exploring new things and growing.

Francesca Sanna acknowledges in an Author’s Note that she is a very anxious person and needed the support of others to finish the research and the creation of Me and My Fear. Her research started by talking to many children in schools and libraries, listening to their fears “about being the new one, the different one, the one from another country.” She also benefited from collaborating with The Reluctant Internationalists at the University of London. As a result, she was able to depict fear through words and illustrations, demonstrating the impact fear can have and what fear does to isolate people. Initially Fear protects the girl from danger, keeping her safe. But as her Fear grows larger with a move to a new country, Fear does not let her explore her new home. Fear transforms into anger when the girl’s name is mispronounced. Fear keeps her from building bridges to new friends and creating cross-cultural understanding. Fear suppresses her appetite. Fear loudly inhabits her room at night, keeping her from getting the rest she needs. Ultimately Fear prompts her to see herself as unlikable, therefore blaming her loneliness on her new home. As the young girl responds to the friendliness of the boy, Sanna gives readers hope for reducing the paralyzing effect of Fear. She acknowledges in her Author’s Note the necessity of surrounding oneself with caring people and, in her Dedication, describes how her parents helped her deal with her own anxiety. She acknowledges the impact of her mother listening to her fears and her father sharing his own fears.

The illustrations in Me and My Fear effectively convey the young girl’s emotions before and after moving to a new country. Her home country is depicted as very colorful, full of nature, and surrounded by other people that resemble the girl. In her home country Fear is pictured as “a tiny friend.” As the story progresses and the young girl immigrates to a new country, Fear “isn’t so little anymore.” This is when the illustrator begins to increase the size of Fear, representing the growth of the young girl’s anxiety about her new surroundings. Her new surroundings are also illustrated with a lot of rain, in contrast to the young girl’s sunny home country. The weather throughout the story changes, illustrating the emotions that the character is feeling at the time. As fear “keeps growing and growing” the other children in the class are pictured as unwelcoming and judgmental of the girl and the character of Fear is so huge it bleeds off the page. Eventually, with the help of a friend, the girl notices that everybody has a friend called Fear, and all the other characters are suddenly more relatable and pictured as friendly.

Books that would pair well with Me and My Fear are books that show the difficulties and hardships that come with immigrating to a new country. These books all specifically focus on the experiences of immigrant children in going to school, making friends, and attempting to adapt to their new environment. In My Two Blankets (Kobald & Blackwood, 2018) two girls connect through art, using drawings to help each other learn the other friend’s language. In The Name Jar (Choi, 2013), the protagonist feels forced to take on an “English” name to make it easier for her classmates until a friend helps her realize her Korean name is beautiful and she should help classmates learn to say and use it. Finally, in I Hate English! (Levine & Bjorkman, 1989), Mei Mei struggles to learn English and, similarly to the girl in Me and My Fear, she isolates herself until an English language tutor reaches out and helps her see some of the joy of a new home and language.

Author-Illustrator Francesca Sanna is from the Italian island of Sardinia, but now resides in Switzerland. She studied and received a degree in illustration, sparking her interest in storytelling. Her illustrations and books have won many awards including the Amnesty International CILIP Honor and the Ezra Jack Keats Honor. More information about Francesca Sanna and her work can be found on her website.

Payton Siragusa, Trinity International University

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