Summary
School Library Journal:
Gr 4-7 –Thirteen-year-old Iqbal Masih was murdered in his Pakistani village in April, 1995, a few months after he had received an international prize and traveled to Sweden and the United States, speaking about his six years as a bonded child in Lahore carpet factories. The murderers–perhaps part of the “Carpet Mafia”–have never been caught. In smoothly translated prose, D’Adamo retells the boy’s story through the eyes of a fictional coworker. Also sold into servitude to pay her father’s debt, Fatima worked in Hussain Khan’s carpet factory for three years and had forgotten almost everything about her previous life. She had grown used to the long hours, the scanty rations, the heat, and the cramped quarters of a life spent tying carpet knots and sleeping beside her loom. She and the others in the workshop are stunned when Iqbal appears and tells them that their debts will never be paid. He tries to convince the children that their situations can change and he escapes to the market where he hooks up with members of the Bonded Labor Liberation Front. Fatima doesn’t come alive as a character in her own right, but the situation and setting are made clear in this novel. Readers cannot help but be moved by the plight of these youngsters. This thinly disguised biography makes little effort to go beyond the known facts of Iqbal’s life. Nonetheless, his achievements were astounding, and this readable book will certainly add breadth to most collections.–Kathleen Isaacs, Edmund Burke School, Washington, DC –Kathleen Isaacs (Reviewed November 1, 2003) (School Library Journal, vol 49, issue 11, p138)
Awards:
- ALA Notable Children’s Books: 2004