REVIEWED BY GEORGIE, 11, WA
Figgy in the World by Tamsin Janu, Omnibus Books, ISBN 9781742990453
Tamsin Janu is a fantastic writer! The book Figgy in the World is about how Figgy needs to find medicine for her Grandma Ama because she has an illness that she won’t tell her about. When you start to read the book Figgy in the World you will find that you can’t put it down!
The story-line of this novel is that Figgy lives in a village in Ghana (Africa) and needs to quickly save her Grandma Ama before she dies. In order to find the medicine for her Grandma, Figgy has to travel all the way to America and then back, with the medicine to save her Grandma before she dies. Alongside her is her goat Kwame who is more like her best friend. However on the journey she meets Nana who becomes her best friend.
Figgy met Nana after he had ran away from his papa. Figgy saw him sitting on the side of the road in the Volta Reigns. He was living in a village with his ‘family’ but none of them were biologically related to him. When Figgy saw Nana she didn’t really know what Nana was doing but then he said, “Would you like to buy some peanuts?”. Figgy had dropped all her money down a drain already so she said, “Sorry, I can’t, I just dropped all my money down the drain and I need to get to America before my Grandma Ama dies.” Nana then wanted to help Figgy, so he ran away from his village without anyone seeing him go. He had only just started his journey with Figgy.
I have never read a book as imaginative as this one. Tamsin Janu uses outstanding abilities to describe scenes in this book that makes you feel like you are there with Figgy and Nana. The fabulous thing about this book is how Tamsin Janu describes the towns and places that Figgy and Nana visit, especially the Orphanage. Nana used to live in this Orphanage when he ran away from his Papa, and when they returned all the children were so delighted to see them it made me want to cry.
I would recommend Figgy in the World for ages 10+, or children slightly younger who can really have an imagination and link the descriptive words to envisaging the scenes Tamsin Janu is writing about. The genre would be drama, and maybe some death too. This book was outstanding and I would definitely read it again! I will surely be reading more of Tamsin Janu’s books. With normal life themes such as friendship, love and death encompassed in this book, I thought it was outstanding and I look forward to reading more of Tamsin Janu’s books in the future.
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This is Georgie’s first book review for Alphabet Soup. If you’d like to read more book reviews by Beaconsfield Primary students, you can click on ‘Beaconsfield Primary School’ in the grey categories box in the right column of this blog. To send us YOUR book review, check out our submission guidelines. Happy reading!
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