Mama Miti: Wangari Maathai and the Trees of Kenya

While Nobel Medalist Wangari Maathai has been the subject of two earlier picture biographies (Jeanette Winter's "Wangari's Trees of Peace" and Claire Nivola's "Planting the Trees of Kenya"), this story is structured more like a folktale, portraying Maathai as healer and botanist. These are strong hands, she tells a woman who does not have enough food to feed her family. Here are seedlings of the "mubiru muiru" tree.... Plant as many as you can. Eat the berries. Nelson's ("We Are the Ship") breathtaking portraits of Maathai often have a beatific quality; bright African textiles represent fields, mountains, and Maathai's beloved trees. Maathai knows that some trees make good firewood, others form hedges to keep livestock safe, while the roots of others clean dirty water. After every encounter, a Kikuyu expression is repeated: Thayu nyumbaPeace, my people. Mama Miti, as Maathai comes to be known (it means mother of trees), is rewarded not with fame or power but with the satisfaction of seeing Kenya restored. Napoli ("The Earth Shook") creates a vivid portrait of the community from which Maathai's tree-planting mission grows. Ages 48. "(Jan.)" Copyright 2009 Publishers Weekly Used with permission.

Gr 3-4--This idealistic account focuses on Wangari's wisdom in advising women to plant different kinds of trees to solve their particular economic problems. "Here are seedlings of the "mukinduri". This tree makes good firewood." "Plant a tree. A "mukawa". Its thorns will keep out predators." Napoli inserts a Kikuyu phrase and its translation after each bit of Wangari's advice. ""Thayu nyumba"""Peace, my people." The story seems to suggest that the trees were a rather quick solution to the people's problems of hunger and poverty in Kenya's devastated landscape. "Soon cool, clear waters teemed with black, wriggling tadpoles]. All over the countryside the trees that had disappeared came back." Nelson depicts the various women and the greening of the landscape in bold collages of textile prints joined with strong painted portraits. The poetic, abbreviated story has little biographical detail, emphasizing the planting of millions of trees and the resulting prosperity and peace for the country and its people. The preface describing the ill effects of earlier drought and the broad sweep of text provide less concrete information and explanation than Claire A. Nivola's "Planting the Trees of Kenya" (Farrar) and Jeanette Winter's "Wangari's Trees of Peace" (Harcourt, both 2008). The information is too vague for primary grade children, and probably too skimpy for older grades. Still, the book could serve as a beautiful introduction for children just learning about the Greenbelt Movement. Concluding materials include an afterword for adults, a source note, a Kikuyu glossary, a list of Web sites most useful for adults, and a brief note from the illustrator."Margaret Bush, Simmons College, Boston" Copyright 2010 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

"This is the true story of Wangari Muta Maathi, a Kenyan woman who helped to bring trees back to a sadly deforested country. Her grassroots efforts to help her people and the environment at the same time had a profound effect not only on Kenya, but on people all over the world who heard her story and who learned her lessons. With a lyrical text and stunning multimedia art, this picture book is a must for every reader, both young and not so young." — Through the Looking Glass Children's Book Review