Sliding Into Home Book Discussion
Sunday I had the honor of being invited and attending a book club meeting with a group of Guatemala adoptive mothers. I am grateful for the warm welcome both I and my book received from the group. I was heartened to hear the ways in which Sliding Into Home touched many of the readers in the group. There were questions about Zorba of course – the favorite character of all – and the different aspects of the book that spoke to each person and family individually. Divorce, race, and adoption are not light topics and for those of us who experience first hand the challenges and triumphs of walking through each day as an adoptive parent or child, a person of color or a family of divorce there is a rich and plentiful well of information to be shared.
I walked away from this circle, as I did after my book’s event at Heritage Camp in Colorado, more convinced than ever that Sliding Into Home is truly a book for both children and adults. Many of the adult readers who have reached out to me to share their enthusiasm for my book’s message, relevance, and thank goodness enjoyable story, have made a point to say that they found the book valuable as an insight into what their own children may be experiencing. How to get the book into the hands of more young readers seems to be a challenge I didn’t anticipate. I hear from parents around me far more often than I’d like that their children are not readers. It seems the internet, and social media and school days that stretch far beyond the 8am to 3pm hours have taken the place of sitting quietly and reading a book. I spent a lifetime of magical summer days, after school evenings, and weekends reading books of all kinds. It appears that the young minds of today are being programmed for quick, lively sound bites of information and the long and leisurely act of sitting down to read a book is no longer a part of their everyday lives.
The book club parents discussed the possibility of creating a forum for their children to read my book and to sit in circle with me, the author, to discuss it. I loved this idea and very much hope that the children will be on board to read Flip’s story and to sit in circle to discuss the ways in which his story speaks to them, to their lives as adolescents coming of age at a time when our country’s challenges are many.
I am hoping that Sliding Into Home will find its way into the schools. I was encouraged by Cassidy Friedman’s conviction that, “This book should be required reading for Middle School students especially in white majority areas. Reading it should be followed by real conversations.” I have a dream that children will sit in circle in many classrooms discussing - as we did last Sunday - race, adoption, and divorce.
If you have an organization, or know of one that might be interested in using Sliding Into Home as a launching ground for meaningful conversation please let me know. I would love to help facilitate circles of discussion about stories that matter.