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When Kambia Elaine Flew in from Neptune Lori Aurelia Williams Books

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When Kambia Elaine Flew in from Neptune Lori Aurelia Williams Books

I have this book and the sequal on cassete tapes, my least favorite way of reading. I would happily purchase both as kindle or audiobooks to read over and over. I don't understand why such highlyrated books aren'available in these formats


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When Kambia Elaine Flew in from Neptune Lori Aurelia Williams Books Reviews

When KAMBIA ELAINE FLEW IN FROM NEPTUNE should be required reading for anyone who aims to write for the young adult novel market. Lori Aurelia Williams has marvelous control of language, plot pacing, and emotion. I was hooked--once I picked the book up, I couldn't put it down.
Which isn't to say that I didn't want to. This book isn't about easy topics, and there are several sub-plots running at one time, which Williams handles skillfully.
Shayla, Williams' narrator, speaks with a wise voice, but not so wise for her age that she simply appears to be the plot-device for the author to say what she wants. Shayla has her own mind, and she's a careful observer. She watches the relationship between her mother and her grandmother and their arguments over the old ways; she watches the relationship between Tia and her mother, and Shayla is one of the first to realize that her mother is all wrong about Tia's boyfriend; she observes Kambia Elaine, who, even though she is "weird" is also a true friend who offers Kayla comfort. And Kayla is incredibly wise to the ways of the man who comes into her mother's life, although she isn't able to warn her mother.
I found Kayla to be a wonderful lens with which to observe the world in which she lives. And, more importantly, I found Kayla to be a delightful girl who I would have loved to have been friends with when I was a teen.
In WHEN KAMBIA ELAINE FLEW IN FROM NEPTUNE, first-time novelist Lori Aurelia Williams fashions a contemporary, coming-of-age tale as beautiful as it is difficult. Her narrator, 12-year-old Shayla Dubois, an aspiring writer with a gift for language, fills her blue notebooks with the observations and emotions ("Tia's nature is boiling out of her like a hot soup out of a pot") she isn't allowed to express --- as children should be seen and not heard.

In parallel plot-lines, Williams explores Shayla's sister Tia's blossoming sexuality and the tension it causes, as well as Shayla's budding friendship with Kambia --- a girl with a far-out imagination who moves in next door with her no-good mother. Hoping to prevent Tia from making the same mistake she did, Shayla's mama puts Tia out of the house when she discovers she is sexually involved with the town dumbbell, Doo-Witty.

Meanwhile, Kambia is filling Shayla's head with stories of Wallpaper Wolves that come to her in the night, Memory Beetles that store good memories in their chubby bodies, and Lizard People that turn into purple chewing gum. At first, Kambia's strange tales and antics annoy the usually word-loving Shayla, but when she accidentally sees Kambia's bruised and bloodied thighs, it dawns on her that something dangerous is lurking in her tortured tales. But when Kambia begs Shayla not to tell anyone about her injuries, Shayla learns, with the help of her wise and opinionated Grandmother Augustine, that sometimes you have to break a promise to protect a friend.

Williams's utterly original and metaphorical treatment of Kambia's sexual abuse, along with her tender handling of Tia's deepening relationship with herself and the seemingly dumb, yet gifted Doo-Witty, combine to create an engaging, original story too good to be missed.

(...)
Shayla, a twelve-year-old girl living in a poor neighborhood with her mother and her older sister Tia, just wants everything in her life to be calm and normal. But then Tia is caught having sex with an older guy named Doo-witty, who everyone in their neighborhood thinks is stupid. Shayla doesn't know what Tia sees in him, but their relationship causes a fight between Tia and their mother, and Tia disappears for months.

To make things even stranger in her life, Kambia and her mother move in next door. Kambia is Shayla's age but she acts really funny. She hums nursery rhymes to herself and plays what Shayla thinks of as babyish games, pretending she's a tree or a piece of driftwood or a crab. She also tells odd stories, about lizard people and memory beetles. Kambia sometimes makes Shayla nervous, but Shayla starts to like her more and more. Then Kambia's stories get scary, about wolves in her wallpaper who try to catch her and hurt her. Shayla has seen bruises on her legs and doesn't understand what could have caused them. And Kambia is losing a lot of weight, saying the wolves won't want her if she is too skinny.

Shayla has promised Kambia that she won't talk to anyone else about Kambia's bruises or her wallpaper wolves stories, but Shayla starts to feel more and more like keeping that promise is the wrong thing to do.

I liked that Shayla was open to a friendship with Kambia, even though Kambia was so strange. I liked the relationship between Shayla and Tia; they weren't always at odds like most sisters. I also liked that Shayla was true to her dream of becoming a writer.

It was very sad, though, to read another depressing story about child abuse in a poor neighborhood. It was easy, reading this book, to see right away what the problem was with Kambia, and it was sad that nobody from the neighborhood realized what was going on.
This is a book I read in middle school. After I read it now I was wondering why would a child be reading a book like this, but it's a great novel. It's sad also
Bringing joy, complexity and a special voice, one that, predates the film Beasts of the Southern Wild, and as truly fantastic. Truth told, it's far from being only a children's book, regardless of the age of its protagonists.
I have this book and the sequal on cassete tapes, my least favorite way of reading. I would happily purchase both as kindle or audiobooks to read over and over. I don't understand why such highlyrated books aren'available in these formats