4 out of 4 stars
Share This Review
Q’á:lemi and the 7 Ravens by eelonqa K harris (here and on Amazon, the name is not capitalized) is a children's book. When I downloaded the PDF file, I was startled to see that the file size was 435 megabits. After I started reading, however, I understood why.
According to the author, this book is an adaptation of the German fairy tale "Die sieben Raben" (The seven Ravens) by the Grimm brothers. For those who don't know, The Coast Salish are Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast who live in British Columbia.
The plot of the book is quite simple. There was a couple who had seven children but who wanted to have a girl. When she was finally born, she was a small, fragile baby. As the medicine woman did not know how to cure the newborn, her father sent his children to find special water to save the life of the girl who had just been born. In the end, all seven children become ravens and, after helping their sister, they will have to be saved by her when she grows up.
What most caught my attention in the book is the quality of the illustrations. The physical characters of the book are three-dimensional miniature replicas of persons from the Coast Salish community. After finishing the book, I learned that the figures were crafted, posed, and dressed with a 3D printer's aid. All of this is fantastic and helps the children to have a better visual understanding of what the Coast Salish community is. That's by far what I liked the most in the book.
There is nothing to dislike about this book. The story teaches children important messages such as the importance of sibling love, how important it is to accept differences between people, and how to live a harmonious life in nature. I couldn't find one single grammatical error in the entire book.
Therefore, I rate Q’á:lemi and the 7 Ravens four out of four stars. The message that the book gives is incredible, and the illustrations are of exceptional quality. I had never read a children's book so different and yet so unique. I recommend this book to all children under ten years old.
******
Q’á:lemi and the 7 Ravens
View: on Bookshelves
