Poetry Review #32

Ordinary Hazards: A Memoir

Author: Nikki Grimes

Publisher: Wordsong, 2019
ISBN: 978-1629798813
Reading Ages: 15 and up

Genre: Poetry for Teens and Young Adults. 

I Gave This Book 4 Roars! 🦁🦁🦁🦁

Why 4 roars? This is an exceptionally well-written memoir. The reader cannot help but feel great sympathy for the author and her older sister. It is also very hard to read. I am not sure it would be something I would suggest for younger readers. I would not really recommend it without great thought and consideration for students under the age of 15. (There might be an exception for younger students with a counselor's supervision in bibliotherapy sessions.) 

Poetic Elements: The author uses free verse with great emotions to impact the reader. It is a narrative that creates a storyteller and a poet worth knowing and respecting. 

"With Ordinary Hazards, Grimes delivers a memoir in the form of a powerful and inspiring collection of poems. She details her early life through adulthood, and she unabashedly explores the highs as well as the lows. Young adults will identify with and connect to the many challenges explored in Grimes’ work, which delves into issues of love, family, responsibility, belonging, finding your place in the world, and fighting the monsters you know—and the ones you don’t. The memoir has heartbreaking moments—even soul-crushing ones—that will make readers ache for young Grimes and teens grappling with similar circumstances. But inspiring moments bolster her raw, resonant story, 

showing that there is always light at the end of the darkest of tunnels."

~~Booklist

Appeal: The author discusses her childhood experiences in this moving memoir.  The topics include relationships, trauma, sadness, hardships, and healing.  Grimes writes, “surviving is almost easy/ if you have a strategy/ and a copy of/ A Wrinkle in Time.”

 "As poetically written as Woodson’s Brown Girl Dreaming with a story as hard-hitting as Sapphire’s Push....the striking free-verse poems powerfully convey how a passion for writing fueled her will to survive and embrace her own resilience.... (a) must-read for aspiring writers." 

~~ The Horn Book 

Overall Quality: The memoir is educational and does have a positive message for the reader. There is violence, drug use, foster homes, graphic rape, gang members, and mental illness. However, it still manages to convey hope and healing to those who might need it most. 

"(W)ritten in highly readable verse and delivers a relatable message characterized by pathos and resilience... this book is an homage to the fortifying effect of written expression. School counselors can use this text as bibliotherapy for students in similar situations (and it) can also act as mentor text in classroom lessons on memoir writing or when teaching confessional poetry." 

~~ School Library Connection

ALA Michael Printz Honor Book (Young Adult), ALA Robert F. Sibert Honor Book (Nonfiction), 2020 Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor Award for Nonfiction, and Arnold Adoff Poetry Award for Teens 

Layout: The book is organized chronologically and begins in 1950 and ends in 1966. 

Connections:

Spotlight Poem -

“October Surprise”

Birthday celebrations

in foster care

are rare.

Who bothers about

the day you were born?

But when I turned seven,

Mrs. B baked

a chocolate cake

with buttercream icing.

I don't recall

anyone baking me

a birthday cake before.

Maybe that's why

I baptized my first slice

with tears.

Sharing: The book could perhaps be shared in a book talk that included portions of the poems read aloud. Students would need to be advised about the topics the memoir included and those topics carefully and sensitively handled. 

School counselors might consider using the book in bibliotherapy sessions. 

    

Activity: A discussion on the different types of memoirs might be a nice activity. Examples might include autobiographical, celebrity, event, childhood, etc. 

Ordinary Hazards: A Memoir -Book Talk