They Poured Fire on Us From the Sky Review by Austin Maske
They Poured Fire on Us From the Sky was a very moving book. There were points when I had to remind myself that this was being told through the eyes of a child. At the beginning of the book you are told of the struggles of simply living the Dinka life. You are told of the dangers of lions and hyenas out in the brush. Then the lives of these boys are turned upside down when their villages are attacked forcing them to scatter into the bush. It's truly one of the greatest survival stories I have read. The whole time you're rooting for what ever boy is at the center of the story at the moment. You get a true glimpse into the life of these Lost Boys who were driven from their parents and struggling to survive in groups, naked, and for the most part unprotected. At every turn you are hoping that the boys will run into each other. The atrocities that they boys witness can be felt in their first person retellings.
Everything seems to be against the boys as they trek all over the place from Ethiopia to Kenya. War seems to loom over the main characters in the book taking their happiness and any sense of security at every turn. The three boys in this story, Benson, Alepho, and Benjamin, all have very different personalities. Each one has their strengths, and weaknesses, but the personality of each boy is changed and truly tested as their journey separates them entirely at points. Alepho and Benson are the "main characters" in the story taking up most of the book. Alepho does a LOT of growing up during the course of this novel. I feel that we get the largest glimpse to the inner workings of Alepho because of how much he changes over the course of the novel. Benson is a very clever boy who utilizes his surroundings to survive. Throughout this whole book you are holding your breath hoping that another child isn't lost.
I think that this is absolutely a terrific book. I would definitely teach this in a classroom, I think it would pair nicely within a unit along with something like Lord of the Flies. The only difficulty teaching this book I think would be the lack of real storyline. It's more a collection of memories that even though VERY moving, would be difficult to keep a high school student's attention. You would have a lot of work making every single reading assignment extremely engaging. That being said if you did manage to get the students through the book it would be a terrific piece to spark future conversations, and would be a really good book to talk about "survival stories." Especially after reading fiction stories, after reading this the students would get an idea about how difficult some children have it.
Everything seems to be against the boys as they trek all over the place from Ethiopia to Kenya. War seems to loom over the main characters in the book taking their happiness and any sense of security at every turn. The three boys in this story, Benson, Alepho, and Benjamin, all have very different personalities. Each one has their strengths, and weaknesses, but the personality of each boy is changed and truly tested as their journey separates them entirely at points. Alepho and Benson are the "main characters" in the story taking up most of the book. Alepho does a LOT of growing up during the course of this novel. I feel that we get the largest glimpse to the inner workings of Alepho because of how much he changes over the course of the novel. Benson is a very clever boy who utilizes his surroundings to survive. Throughout this whole book you are holding your breath hoping that another child isn't lost.
I think that this is absolutely a terrific book. I would definitely teach this in a classroom, I think it would pair nicely within a unit along with something like Lord of the Flies. The only difficulty teaching this book I think would be the lack of real storyline. It's more a collection of memories that even though VERY moving, would be difficult to keep a high school student's attention. You would have a lot of work making every single reading assignment extremely engaging. That being said if you did manage to get the students through the book it would be a terrific piece to spark future conversations, and would be a really good book to talk about "survival stories." Especially after reading fiction stories, after reading this the students would get an idea about how difficult some children have it.