This Thing Called the Future

This Thing Called the Future by J.L. Powers

ISBN: 9781933693958
El Paso, TX : Cinco Puntos Press, 2011

Plot - Khosi, 16, and her grandmother, Gogo, live together in a shanty town in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa along with Khosi's little sister, Zi.  Khosi and Zi's mother comes home on weekends from her job in the city as as teacher.  They and everyone around them are desperately poor, fearing for their lives from dangers on all sides--AIDS, bands of gangs who would steal the food out of a baby's mouth, and Khosi in particular has to beware would-be rapists on her way to school who are looking for young girls who are virgins and not yet infected with AIDS.  What Khosi has to give some shape to her future, though, is science and her family's traditions.  She loves to study science, and she is well aware of the power of the old ways--both to heal and to destroy.  When Khosi's mother becomes mysteriously ill, throwing up blood, and refuses to go to the doctor, Khosi must blaze a trail through the devastation around her, her mother's superstition combined with fear of medical doctors, and her own fears to a place where she can make a difference in her mother's life and perhaps in the lives of many others.

Critical Evaluation - Written beautifully in the first person, this painful, story of hope, ultimately, in the face of ruin is both touching and wrenching.  Khosi reveals her world to the reader sparing no detail--sickness, death, rape, thievery, dreadful poverty--but Powers never casts her as a helpless victim.  Balancing this, she is also a real girl full of fears and doubts, no fantasy heroine.  Powers communicates with great effect the world of an otherwise invisible individual person trapped in a time when those her mother's age were full of hope for freedom from the oppressive white, European regime, yet the AIDS epidemic was destroying the people from within.  Powers's prose is spare, never flowery or sentimental, and the narrator's tone is completely believable even though most readers in North America have no idea what would constitute believable in Khosi's life.  The plot is carefully measured, heartbreaking and inspiring in turns.  

Reader's annotation - Khosi lives between two worlds and times--her elder's history that includes witchcraft and traditional healing, and her own time that includes AIDS and western medicine--will she be able to knit them together in her own self enough to save her mother's life and give her little sister hope for a good life? 
Genre - YA realistic fiction
Curriculum Ties - Fantastic for upper level classes studying history of South Africa and/or the AIDS epidemic.  Excellent also for English composition classes studying narrative voice far outside anticipated readers' experience.
Booktalk ideas - 

1. Read the passage where Khosi really notices Little Man for the first time and vows to stand up to an attacker in the future.  Begin on pg. 22 with "Did he hurt you Khosi?" and end with "...I wonder if I'll have the courage to keep it" on pg. 23.
2. Read the passage where Khosi goes to see the sangoma healer.  Begin on pg. 34 with "As I wait in the queue..." and end on pg. "They're saying you're in danger, little Khosi...".

Reading level - Kirkus Review states 12+, but I might edge a little older.  Some of the content is very intense and painful, and without a bit more maturity both in the history of the area and simply emotional growth, this book could be overwhelming and the meaning lost.  My recommendation is 14+.

Challenge issues - violence

Challenge defense ideas:

• Librarian must read the book carefully and include it as a resource intended for older teens.
• Librarian greets students and regularly discusses their reading choices; she provides individualized, age-appropriate guidance in book choice.
• Explain the ways in which the librarian accompanies and guides younger students looking for books, and knows students well as individuals. 

Why I included this book - This Thing Called the Future is not at core about a girl in South Africa suffering South Africa's hardships.  It's about a girl who is suffering and who struggles every day to take the next step in front of her toward a better life for herself and her family.  That is a worldwide experience for teens, and this beautifully written book stands to represent any young person who must survive awful circumstances.