Crossing the Stream
by Elizabeth-Irene Baitie (Author)
Ato hasn't visited his grandmother's house since he was seven. He's heard the rumors that she's a witch, and his mother has told him he must never sit on the old couch on her porch. Now here he is, on that exact couch, with a strange-looking drink his grandmother has given him, wondering if the rumors are true. What's more, there's a freshly dug hole in her yard that Ato suspects may be a grave meant for him.
Meanwhile at school, Ato and his friends have entered a competition to win entry to Nnoma, the island bird sanctuary that Ato's father helped create. But something is poisoning the community garden where their project is housed, and Ato sets out to track down the culprit. In doing so, he brings his estranged mother and grandmother back together, and begins healing the wounds left on the family by his father's death years before.
And that hole in the yard? It is a grave, but not for the purpose Ato feared, and its use brings a tender, celebratory ending to this deeply felt and universal story of healing and love from one of Ghana's most admired children's book authors.
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Publishers Weekly
All Ghanaian 12-year-old Ato Turkson wants is to visit Nnoma, "the biggest bird sanctuary in all of Africa," which his father helped build before his death, when Ato was an infant. Now, five years after it last opened, an opportunity to visit the exclusive island arises through an environmental project competition. With his oldest friends, fearless Dzifa and obedient Leslie, Ato decides to grow vegetables with natural pesticides. Concurrently, his mother suddenly tells him he'll visit his paternal grandmother every weekend--following five years' estrangement. Though Ato has fond memories of Nana, his mother and the Prophet of Fire, a local spiritual leader, urge him to be wary of Nana's witchery and porch sofa. While Ato grows closer to Nana, comforted by her stories of his father, his community grows cagey when animals and crops start to die. As Ato becomes more suspicious of the Prophet and determined to save his community, he strives to turn his concerns into courage. Baitie (The Lion's Whisper) offers a fully fleshed, sensorially detailed narrative exploring regret and the manipulation of fears through the lens of children's curiosity in her absorbing latest. Ages 9-12. Agents: Sarah Odedina and Deborah Ahenkorah, Accord Literary. (June)
Copyright 2021 Publishers Weekly, LLC Used with permission.Review quotes
Family life
Self-realization
Ghana
Accra (Ghana)
