was a compelling read for many reasons, The most important being that this is actually happening in Kenya, camels loaded with books travel to remote villages and lend library books to villagers.
This is a work of fiction and Fi, the main character, travels by camel everyweeks to the village Mididima in Kenya, where she becomes enamored with some of the people there.
Anything more would probably be a spoiler so enjoy ! Fiona Sweeney is an American librarian with a desire to do something with her life, something that matters.
Her family has always been rooted in the same New York neighborhood, but Fi isn't content to stay rooted.
Instead, she decides to take a job in Kenya, helping to start a traveling library, The library takes books, by camel, to different tribes of people throughout the bush of northeastern Kenya,
The people of Mididima have differing feelings about the traveling books, Matani was sent away by his father to be educated in Nairobi, and he returned to teach the children of Mididima.
However, most of the people of Mididima do not share his values or appreciation for books and learning.
They believe that by learning to read the stories are lost because people do not make an effort to keep them in their brains to retell them orally.
The elders know that the paper can be destroyed, but if the story is in one's brain, it cannot go away, it cannot be lost.
Many of the people of Mididima want the library to stop coming altogether, And when Taban, a. k. a. Scar Boy, does not return his library books, an action that is strictly forbidden, chaos erupts in the community.
I fell in love with The Camel Bookmobile on page one, paragraph one,
One of the strengths of this novel is Hamilton's efforts to take the reader inside the minds of the characters, all of the characters.
The point of view changes by chapter, alternating between Fi, various people of Mididima, and the Kenyan librarian.
The reader is able to experience the plot from different age perspectives, different cultural perspectives, different gender perspectives.
The mesh of these perspectives illustrates the mammoth complexity of cultural change,
Fi travels to Kenya with the best of intentions, but what Fi doesn't realize is that she is seeing everything through the eyes of Western culture.
And likewise, the people of Mididima who are dead set against literacy see things through the eyes of their own culture.
And when Nature begins to tell them that their way of life cannot be sustained much longer, their response is not to learn a new way of living but rather to move to another geographic location that will support their present way of life.
The novel is almost a tennis match, volleying back and forth between the two cultures, But then there are times when the cultures mesh and the similarities between fellow members of the human race emerge.
The themes of this novel are powerful, and they raise questions that don't have right or wrong answers.
Themes of this magnitude demand threedimensional characters with strengths
and flaws characters who are forever and realistically altered by the events they experience.
Hamilton doesn't disappoint on this front, The silent and most powerful character is Nature, Hamilton manages to brilliantly blend the setting into character in this novel, The beautiful Kenyan bush is also a remorseless killer and it plays as much a role in the community as any of the human characters do.
I can't imagine reading this book and not being more aware of how we view cultures that differ from our own.
The Camel Bookmobile is a stunning multilayered, multiperspective novel about tolerance, about humanity, about change, I highly recommend it. Not an awful book but definitely not one to keep or recommend, The main story was just ok and I wanted to know how it turned out but I did not enjoy the individual stories and I didn't care for the characters.
None of the characters were well developed, I always felt as if they were a bit unfocused and there wasn't enough for me to grab on to.
The book follows an American, Fi, to Africa as she volunteers to guide a new library program that sends books out to the villages on the African plains.
The books and people travel to the villages via camel, therefore its the Camel Bookmobile, We meet many of the residents of one village and bounce back and forth between them with every chapter.
I don't even recommend this one as a light inbetween book, I was left with more questions than answers and it definitely didn't leave me satisfied,
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I thought the ending sucked.
Royally. We were left with wide open stories with no ending, I get that everything can't be a "happy ending" but this one was very disappointing, What happened to Taban What happened to Kanika wanting to leave the village, Are we supposed to believe that just because she gets into a relationship we're presuming since that isn't even conclusive, she would lose her dream to leave Are we supposed to believe that Taban is left as he was and nothing changes for him How sad.
. . And, what happened to Fi Did she return to America Did she search for Matani at all Would she search for him What happened to Matani Did he end his marriage or go back to Jwahir as if nothing had happened sigh Fiona is an idealist who is tired of her New York life and wants to do something more to make her mark on the world.
When she reads of an opportunity to work on a Camel Bookmobile, she decides to go immediately, even though her friends and family don't fully approve.
Once in Africa though, the story focuses less on her, and more on the lives of the people of the small nomadic tribe of Mididima.
Here people's lives are changing, in reaction to the ideas the books bring, the threat it brings to their way of life, the prospect of a coming drought.
The story is very simply written, but it's powerful, It raises a lot of questions about the process, Is it really ethical to bring literacy to these people Can it really help them The problems it brings up and the resolution that Hamilton decides on were heartbreaking but ultimately, I felt, appropriate.
This was especially good to read because I've been dealing with mixing cultures as we have had exchange students stay with us.
Obviously entirely different things, but some of the miscommunications and things Fiona was learning sound awfully familiar right now! A downside of living abroad in a country with a different language is that the selection of books in English is always minimal.
Searching through the raggedy shelves at hostels or touristoriented cafes becomes a treasure hunt, Finding a copyElation. Finding out that it is in German Back to the shelves,
All of which is to say, I didnt pick up this book on purpose, But I finished it because a lack of other options,
If you want a book where you can lose track of how often African is used as an adjective, this is the book for you.
An entirely heavyhanded account of a naïve dogooder in Kenya, and the unintentional consequences/responses to her portable library.
I admire Ms. Hamiltons desire to show the more complex side of development, but to literally have a board meeting where the corporate sponsors declare they only wanted good press and dont actually care This total lack of subtlety runs through the entire book, taking what could have been an interesting premise into a rather dull and flat story.
Loved this book!
It gave me a fresh perspective on how helping "those in need" may be done to benefit the helper more than "the needy.
" Do those who have their own traditions and live apart from modern society really need to learn how to do things "our way" Is it better If so, better for whom
I thought the book was well researched and the characters well developed.
I also think it would make a great movie,
Absolutely five. .
Scan The Camel Bookmobile Assembled By Masha Hamilton Readable In Audio Books
Masha Hamilton