Books for Africa Receives Donation

I have featured Books for Africa several times on this blog.  It is such a worthwhile and noble charity, so this news is especially wonderful.

Books for Africa, the St. Paul, Minn.-based organization that collects donated books and ships them to schools and libraries in 49 African countries, has announced that the Nigerian-based Sir Emeka Offor Foundation has donated $600,000 to BFA. It is the largest cash donation BFA has received in its 25-year history. 

The money will be used to ship 1.1 million books to Nigeria, as well as to The Gambia, Somalia, Liberia, Tanzania, Namibia, Senegal, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Botswana, South Africa, Sierra Leone, Egypt, and Malawi.

The Sir Emeka Offor Foundation was founded by a Nigerian business entrepreneur in the mid-1990s to “positively render assistance” to those in need, “irrespective of tribe, creed, religion and nation.” 

BFA Founder Tom Warth with students

The foundation, which emphasizes health and education programs in Nigeria and beyond, began partnering with BFA in 2010 to ship books to Nigeria and The Gambia. To date, the foundation has sponsored the shipment of 640,000 books to those two countries through BFA, including 110,000 books in 2012 as part of BFA’s “Million Books to The Gambia” campaign.

Since 1988, BFA has shipped 28 million books to Africa from the United States.

For Mother Africa and Malawi's Women--A New Children's Book

As we are still in the generous holiday mood, have a look at a marvelous book, well written and delicious to view.  It would be so beneficial for it to find its way into your library for reasons on multiple levels. 

 Conceived on a visit to Malawi last year, When The Rains Come is written for children by poet and writer Tom Pow.   

The book is in support of a truly amazing clinic, established to save the lives of new mothers and infants. And it would not be there if it was not for MUMs, the Edinburgh-based charity, Malawi Underprivileged Mothers.

 The book is available from bookshops and the MUMs website, 
http://mumsrecipes.org. It tells the tale of a family encountering some of the realities of life in today’s Africa, while nurturing the imagination with tales of the animals that inhabit the continent, including King Tortoise to the Lion and the Elephant.  The illustrations of Malika Favre are powerful and work so well.

Pow is an experienced and successful writer. But this book uses more than his skills. It communicates his passion for Malawi and the people who live there.

 He reminds us of the basic humanity we all share.  African children face many uncertainties of life but still love a bedtime story and long to sleep unafraid.

The MUMs charity has grown too.  As short a time ago as 2005, it was a filthy, unhealthy place where dedicated but demoralized staff helped 12,000 women give birth every year in squalid conditions. One baby died every day and one woman almost every week. 

One in ten Malawian children will die before the age of five, and one in every 200 women can expect to die in childbirth. Around 10 per cent of the population are HIV positive, and the number of pediatricians can be counted on one's fingers. In a population of 13 million, it remains a humanitarian disaster.

Please buy this worthwhile and beautiful book for your children, your grandchildren or any little one in your life. Enjoy the magic in story and pictures, and make a small contribution to saving lives in the 
warm heart of Africa.

Z is for Zulu

The Zulu are a South African ethnic group of an estimated 17-22 million people who live mainly in the province of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.

A patriarchal society, the gender roles of Zulu are clearly delineated, with the boys and men organized as warriors in support of the king. The Zulu Kingdom played a major role in South African History during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Under apartheid, Zulu people were classed as third-class citizens and suffered from state sanctioned discrimination.

 Today, they are the most numerous ethnic group in South Africa, and have equal rights along with all other citizens. They are famous for their bead work, which is not only beautiful but traditionally the patterns were used for communication. Their music also has become popular worldwide.

When my family and I were in South Africa a few years ago, we had the opportunity to meet several Zulu women.  They were working in a cooperative making beautiful bead work while their young children attended pre-school on the premises.

This is a win-win situation for all concerned.  The women are helping support their children, who are learning in a structured safe environment. 

The bead work made by the Zulu women is some of the finest of its kind in the world.  An empowering situation for the mothers and a nurturing environment for their young children.  What could be better for these worthy and proud people!    

 

Mayra Calvani's Interview with me at Mayra's Secret Bookcase

Nancy is the bestselling author of the four Bella and Britt Series books for children: One Pelican at a Time (eighteen weeks on Amazon Bestselling List), Sea Turtle Summer, Bella Saves the Beach and Mystery at Manatee Key. All are published by Guardian Angel Publishing.

(The trailer for Sea Turtle Summer can be found at the end of this post.)

She and One Pelican at a Time and were featured in the PBS Tampa (WEDU) special, GulfWatch. Pelican was nominated for a Global eBook Award and has won the Literary Classics Seal of Approval.
Nancy’s travels take her extensively throughout the world, most particularly Africa. She is US chair of a charity in Lamu, Kenya, that places girls in intermediate schools to allow them to further their education. She and her husband live in Tampa and St. Louis.
I understand you were a university professor teaching classes about children’s and young adult literature before you started writing. How did the leap from teacher to author come about?

I thought fleetingly about writing for children through my years as an academic, but it never seemed the right time. After teaching children’s and young adult literature, though, the idea crystallized. The day after my granddaughter, Leah, was born, I wrote my first children’s book, I Held You on the Day You Were Born. Since then I’ve never looked back, and those pent-up books flow faster than I would ever have expected. So, in a real way, Leah (who is now five) is the true catalyst behind my writing.

What makes you passionate about writing for children?

My entire academic career has been about children, from teaching young kids to teaching pre-service teachers. It was, I think, a natural segue to begin writing for them. The combination of my love of all things books and the real joy I feel about children and their growing awareness of new ideas led me to this passion.

Congratulations on the publication of your latest children’s picture book, Sea Turtle Summer. What was your inspiration for this story?

My morning walks on Clearwater Beach provide me with so many ideas, particularly for the Bella and Britt Series. With Sea Turtle Summer, I walked by a cordoned off area of the beach that contained a sea turtle nest. The orange tape and the affixed state seal warning about the serious consequences of tampering began the process in my mind.
Clearwater Beach, always voted one of the three best beaches in the world, is a sea turtle’s nightmare if she happens to lay her eggs there. There is so very much activity—from sun worshiping, to volleyball games, to kids’ digging sandcastles (hatchlings cannot get over them), the problem became defined. The tension was set up. All we needed was a sea turtle laying her eggs in an unfortunate place, and Bella and Britt were back on the job!

I understand you get up at dawn everyday and by 6am are already pounding away at your keyboard on the balcony of your beautiful, gulf-view Clearwater apartment. Tell us more about your writing schedule and writing process, especially for Sea Turtle Summer.

It is true that I’m at my computer around six each morning and has become a joke with friends who always look at the time I send or answer emails! I do find that time to be more productive for me than any other.
I’ve learned to parcel my days into bunches of hours, each bunch dealing with one area. For instance, my best creative writing is early in the morning. About mid-morning, I turn to marketing and do that several hours. Later in the day, I go back to writing, many times on a different manuscript. I tend to finish about 5 PM, but my computer is sometimes on my lap in the evening as well.

My blog does take some time almost daily. I publish new posts three times a week. I try to write them in groups and usually have seven or eight ready to go. I enjoy blogging and find writing for adults helps keep my mind focused in a different way. In that regard, it’s a worthwhile exercise.

What do you do when the words ‘just won’t come out’? Do you stay and force it until something begins happening on the page?
Free Association is the name of that game for me. I don’t fight writer’s block anymore. Rather, exercise or running errands or doing anything not related to writing helps greatly. When I’m disengaged from writing is usually when engagement happens. An idea, a notion, a nugget of a thought will pop into my consciousness and, as if by magic, the block is finished.

Do you have any tips for aspiring children’s authors?

Yes! Don’t write in a vacuum! Join a writer’s group—immediately. It is the best thing you can do for yourself. The Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) is beyond valuable for the new writer, and local groups are everywhere.

Realize you have to promote your own book, and you must do it constantly. The days of sitting back and letting your publishing house do it are over! I have a friend whose name you’d recognize here. She’s had thirty two books children’s books published. Recently she told me that she still gives one day a month to marketing.
Is there anything else you’d like to share with my readers?

I’d be delighted to share my web and blog addresses and tell them where my books can be purchased.
Web site: http://www.nancystewartbooks.com
Blog site: http://www.nancystewartbooks.blogspot.com  

The books are sold at: Guardian Angel Publishing, amazon.com, barnes & noble.com,Fictionwise and my web and blog sites, where you can obtain a personalized, autographed copy.
Thank you, Nancy!

Thank you so much, Mayra, for hosting me. I enjoyed being with you and your guests.

Mayra's Secret Bookcase is a marvelous blog, and it is my hope you will take a look at it!

The Children's Book Project a Huge Success in Tanzania

There is blue carpet on the library floor of Miembeni Primary School.  It’s a simple addition that helps foster a welcoming environment at the Tanzanian government school.

(Please see video of the school and The Children's Book Project in action at bottom of post.)

In one of the world’s poorest countries, it’s not easy providing free primary education for all.
Too often there is a lack of basic infrastructure.  Children learn as best they can crammed into sterile concrete rooms, some with floors of gravel.

It’s difficult to promote literacy when a school doesn’t have library books.  The few available textbooks are shared one for every four or five students  Yet the library at Miembeni primary school in Dar es Salaam is a relative oasis. There are bookshelves that hold a wealth of reading – 485 books at last count.

In the underprivileged area of Vingunguti , books in the local language of Kiswahili are a luxury.  In fact, the Children’s Book Project, which provides the school and 110 other school libraries with books, is the primary developer of children’s storybooks in Kiswahili.

Although classroom space is a precious commodity in government schools, where up to 200 students can cram a single class, Miembeni Primary has decided to dedicate space to a library. 

The walls are alive with color from the numbers painted in canary and coral to the hand-drawn posters. There’s a paper mache giraffe learning on a bookshelf and several hand drawn portraits of current and past leaders. Each decoration demonstrates how far students and teachers have come in developing and using teaching aids.

Grade 3 student Balozi Tesha is among the students visiting the library one afternoon. He is reading his favorite book, Maandazi Matamu. It’s a book about snacks and he says he likes it because it teaches how to eat a balanced diet. Tesha speaks in confident, even tones as he explains in Kiswahili that if it were not for the school’s library, he would go to the national library.

Balozi says he likes the library because it will help him get educated and be aware of different issues. One day he hopes to become a pilot.

As a testament to the students’ dedication to the program, it is the students who are responsible to help clean, maintain and operate the library.  The program is paying dividends and Miembeni primary regularly comes out with several awards given out by the Children’s Book Project each year to recognize children.

The improvement can be seen in cold, hard numbers too. Pass rates in the primary school leaving exam have gone from 65 per cent in 2002 to 89 per cent last year.

A real reading success story in Tanzanea thanks to people who care about kids and their future.