Summary
When Raftworld faces a problem with overcrowding, its leader, the Raft King, is forced to track down a young boy, Pip, who has a special gift that could provide a solution to all of the nation’s problems. Unfortunately, Pip’s sister, Kinchen doesn’t see it that way. Protective of her younger brother, Kinchen sets off to bring Pip home with a new friend in tow.
Born with great gifts, twins Venus and Swimmer are bound for amazing things, but they must first survive their current reality- their journey on the slave ship, Zong. After being thrown overboard into the sea, the siblings must use their gifts to not only save themselves but everyone else too as they begin their journey to find home.
When home no longer is a safe place, Thanh and Sang join their Uncle Truc and a few strangers on a dangerous journey to find refuge. They must each leave behind all that they have ever known, including people they love, in the hopes of finding a better life for themselves. But life at sea is hard. They face many dangers, as they each learn more about themselves and others, before accidentally finding an opening to another world that leads them to safety.
Readers will be amazed as they watch Bouwman intricately weave these three stories across cultures, time, and worlds to create a single, beautiful tale about history, home, and hope.
How does this story relate to the world as you see it?
My favorite thing about this book is the way that the author, H.M. Bouwman, seems to effortlessly construct this fantastical story about other worlds and krakens seamlessly into a novel that contains major elements of historical fiction. As a reader, I never ceased to be surprised, and pleased, as another connection was made to the Zong slave ship, the Vietnam War, and even Amelia Earhart. Coming to the close of the book, I remained eager to see how Bouwman would tie these three stories together to create a sort of “circle of life”. She even continued to surprise me in the final pages with an additional, unexpected twist!
This story relates to the history that I have learned about growing up and the world that I know today. Its characters provide accurate and approachable perspectives for readers to encounter history, and even present-day events, in a new way. In “A Crack in the Sea” Uncle Hung aims to convince Mai to stay in the second world by saying, “Here you are already in your new country. Your home” (Bouwman, 2017, p.297). This quote nods at the refugee crises that countries all around our world are facing today. Like these refugees, each of the characters in this story comes to find themselves as a member of a community that accepts them and the individual “gifts” that they bring to the world. Young readers will even be able to view themselves as heroes and world changers because Bouwman’s storyline is centered on young people, like themselves, doing those exact things.
Classroom Connections
Admittedly, this book would be a reach for me to use in my own classroom given the complexity of the readability and the storyline. However, the natural classroom connection that I see with this book is character mapping. Often, as readers mature, they are presented with texts that include more and more characters which creates a plot that this wonderfully rich with life but can also sometimes be confusing.
I remember the first book that I ever read like this. It had so many characters my head spun, and I didn’t know how to approach it. I found it confusing because I didn’t know how to keep up with who all of the characters were, what they were each doing, and how each of them were related. Much like other comprehension skills, students need (and deserve) to be explicitly taught how to map out the characters in a story so that they feel all books as accessible to them (not just those with limited characters).
Personally, I would teach character mapping using the Gradual Release of Responsibility model. After reading and being introduced to a handful of character I would begin creating a character map in front of my students. I would add the names of characters we already knew as well as important things about each of them. I would highlight any significant character connections (like drawing lines between Old Ren, Kinchen, and Pip because Old Ren adopted Kinchen and Pip which makes the two of them siblings). I would model all of my thinking aloud for students. Then, we would continue reading until another appropriate stopping point arose. At this time, I would add more characters to the map that we previously started with the help of student. We would complete the map using the same process of adding new characters, information about them, and connections they have to other characters. We would also continue to add significant information that we had learned to our existing characters. Finally, we would continue reading, and I would release students to complete the character mapping process independently. After their character maps are finished, I would have the students come back together for us to discuss and compare our maps. Students would present about elements of their map by addressing and defending their connections between characters. Students would be encouraged to add to their own map based on the discussion with their peers.
Bouwman, H.M. (2017). A crack in the sea. New York, NY: G.P. Putnam’s Sons an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC.
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