Review Detail

A Long Walk To Water By Linda Sue Park (2010) is historical fiction based on real events and people and is an accessible story for children 10 and above. Moreover, anyone wanting to learn more about what a “Lost Boys” of Sudan endured, will find this a satisfying read.
A Long Walk To Water is told from two voices, a girl named Nya and a boy named Salva. They both are eleven years old, and both live in Sudan. Nya’s story is set in 2008 and this eleven-year-old walks two hours one way to get water for her family. She does this twice a day. Salva’s story is set in 1985, the time of the Second Sudanese Civil War. Salva walks away from his war-torn villages and keeps walking to another country and to refugee centers.
These are real stories of very young people carrying heavy emotional, physical, and generational burdens in one of the poorest countries of the world. Most of the population lives in what we Americans would likely consider as unbelievably hard conditions.
The book jacket explains, and I agree; “This mesmerizing narrative follows two threads – with one hopeful message: that even in a troubled country, determined survivors may find the future they are hoping for.”