From School Library Journal
Gr 7 Up-From humble beginnings in 1996, the Children's Movement for Peace in Colombia has grown to more than 100,000 active members. Nine teenagers describe how their involvement with it has helped them cope with the harsh realities of living in a country awash in violence. Readers will be moved by their stories and their hope. At 14, Juan Elias attended the UNICEF-sponsored meeting that laid the groundwork for the organization and its first activity, a nationwide election in October, 1996, in which children between the ages of 7 and 18 chose life and peace as their most important rights. Shortly after that meeting, his father was murdered. Beto, also a victim of family violence, runs child-rights groups and organizes recreational activities for adolescents. His friend Maritza is less clear; on a trip to Holland to talk with schoolchildren about the violence in Colombia, she was "afraid to admit that no matter how much you try to make peace," she finds it easy to be dragged back into violence at home and on the street. Johemir uses puppets in Return to Happiness workshops to help younger children recover from traumatic experiences. Through this selection of tangentially connected lives, Cameron has told the larger story of the breadth of violence and the growth and work of this coalition. The book concludes with a helpful list of resources about the movement and its supporters. Thought-provoking reading both for teenagers and the adults who serve them.Kathleen Isaacs, Edmund Burke School, Washington, DC
Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
Gr. 7-12. In 1998, Cameron, known for her adult fiction, traveled to Columbia on behalf of UNICEF to write about the Children's Movement for Peace that was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. She chose the stories of nine members of the movement for the personal essays that make up this collection. In their own words, these young people describe what it means to live amidst the violence of their country's 40-year-old war. They've lost their homes, land, and livelihood and have watched assassinations of parents and other family members. Most amazing are the stories of how each person learned to step beyond the desire for retribution. The language is immediate, frank, and unsensationalized, and each gripping story is both specific to its Columbian setting and universal. Even though most readers won't know the fear of living during wartime, urban teens can relate to the violence in their own neighborhoods and find inspiration in young people working effectively towards peace. Gillian Engberg
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
From the Publisher
In 1998, UNICEF invited Sara Cameron to research and write about the Children's Movement for Peace. Her report was submitted to the Nobel Committee in support of the Movement's nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize. Cameron was deeply moved by meeting and writing about the children. She proposed this book so that she could follow their extraordinary work and ensure that their stories would read a wider audience.
From the Author
Despite the peace talks, massacres and assassinations have continued in Colombia, kidnappings have increased and so have the number of families forced to abandon their homes. Human rights activists are often threatened. Many have been forced into exile. Some have been murdered. Yet despite the slowness of progress towards ending the war, fears that members of the Children's Movement would become disillusioned and give up the struggle for peace seem unfounded. Farlis told me, 'My generation is the one that will make the peace, but we won't get to enjoy it for a long time. The babies that are being born today, they are the ones who will know what peace means.' Mayerly said, 'Of course we want to have peace immediately, but just because it doesn't come that isn't a reason to give up. If you give up on peace, how will you ever achieve it?' As the originator and author of OUT OF WAR, my name appears on the front cover, but the book truly belongs to the remarkable young people who share their fears, tragedies, dreams and courageous work for peace inside these pages. saracameron@outofwar.org
About the Author
Cameron has written extensively on the lives and struggles of women and children in the world's poorest countries. Her first novel, NATURAL ENEMIES, won a Turner Tomorrow Award as well as the Edward Abbey Award for Eco-Fiction.
