Author | Pat McKissack |
---|---|
Illustrator | Leo Dillon, Diane Dillon |
Language | English |
Genre | Children's literature, picture book, poetry |
Published | 2011 (Schwartz & Wade Books) |
Publication place | USA |
Media type | Print (hardback) |
Pages | 48 |
ISBN | 9780375843846 |
OCLC | 651153676 |
Never Forgotten is a 2011 picture book by Pat McKissack about a blacksmith father in West Africa who has Musafa, his son, kidnapped by slavers and with the assistance of the four elements discovers that Musafa is working in Charleston as a blacksmith's apprentice.
School Library Journal, in a review of Never Forgotten, wrote "As an author, Patricia McKissack has always had a knack for language. Her wordplay can be a delight to listen to .. or chill you to the core. Here, she does both at once." and concluded " Ms. McKissack is striding into new territory here. And while I might have tweaked that ending a bit, there’s no denying that as a visual and audible product, Never Forgotten it is difficult to find a match. .. A true, unadulterated, original."[1]
The Horn Book Magazine found "The free-verse text can weigh heavily on the ear, but the Dillons' rousing illustrations -- at once bold, complex, and lucid -- impart dramatic conviction to the thwarted Fire and the slave-boat beyond reach, the pursuing Wind peering into the Carolina blacksmith's window."[2]
Never Forgotten has also been reviewed by Publishers Weekly,[3] and Kirkus Reviews[4]
It was a 2012 Coretta Scott King Author Award honor book.[5]
The willingness to turn the dark history of the past into literature takes not just talent but courage. McKissack has both.
A totally absorbing poetic celebration of loss and redemption.