A Crack in the Sea
Author: H.M. Bouwman
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Illustrator: Yuko Shimizu
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Date: 2017
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About the book:
Imagine a world where you can travel to a new place entirely different from your own. A combination of magic powers and family bonds all coming together at once. A Crack in the Sea is a story of three families from all different parts of life coming together in a new world to have a fresh start. Even though the journey was long and confusing, while working together to could find a place for everyone.
ABOUT THE BOOK:
Defining What "Home" Is
Throughout this book, all the characters are constantly wondering, "what is home?" Whether students are running away from war, running away from problems, or trying to find answers, they are constantly searching for home. For Thahn, Sang, Uncle Truc, Uncle Hung, The Turtle and Mai and (people on the boat), they were trying to escape war in Vietnam and find a new home in Malaysia or Thailand. Either Mother Nature or magical powers, stopped this from happening. A Crack in the Sea is constantly switching between two very different worlds. The "gate" between both worlds doesn't open often, but when it does people are sucked into a portal under the water where they then enter the Second World. When this happens to Thahn, Sang, Mai and the rest of the boat, they feel both excited and confused. For Thahn and Sang this was a new start with a new family since their parents passed away. For Uncle Truc and Uncle Hung, this was not home. Home for them was their existing family back in Vietnam during a war.. Finally, for Mai, home wasn't anywhere. She found comfort in traveling and going wherever she could to help. Home doesn't always have to be a physical place.
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For Pip and Kinchen, the new world provided new opportunities. A chance at a new way to look at life. Pip had always been seen as a follower by his sister, until one day he was put into a leadership position. This is something that he has always wanted, but never knew how to ask for it. His magical powers were always seen as weird because of his ability to talk to fish and his inability to recognize faces. When he was called for official business and had to make a huge decision, he started to feel like he was finding his home within a new community. He was accepted and had an opportunity to restart. For Pip, restarting was home for him. For Kinchen, her home was always Pip. She always tried to lead the situations because she knew her brother was different, but even as a follower she still felt at home. She found comfort in a person rather than a physical place, so no matter where she was, as long as he was with Pip she felt at home.
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For the Raft King, he thought his home was finding his mother. He had felt lost for years and when given an opportunity to find her, he was going to do anything and everything to make that happen, even kidnapping Pip. Raft King believed that family was home and he probably still would've if he didn't find out that his mother had passed away. Raft King later found home in his community of the Raft World. Even given the opportunity to travel and rule a new place, he still found comfort in his original home. It was all he has ever known and that is what he needed in his life. It took a devastating loss for him to realize this.
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Overall, home doesn't have to be a structure or place. For most characters in this book, home was feeling comfortable. It may have been a huge change from what they knew, but the people around them and the opportunities provided was what gave them purpose in their "home." Thahn was able to become something he never thought was possible, a storyteller. He was given a figure to follow and takeover one day. That was home for him. It reminded him of how his father told stories, therefore he knew he could find comfort in this new land. For the uncles, home was where they first started. Not only was it familiar, it was where family was.
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There are many ways to define "home." This is a lesson that could easily be taught to any student. It is something everyone must learn. A house doesn't always mean a home. Home can be a feeling, a person, a place, or even an idea. Once you open your mind to this concept, you can find comfort in something you never thought of before.
For older students, you can use this video as another source to talk about what makes a home. This video talks a lot about hard hitting issues, like violence, refugee camps, immigration, etc. Finding a home can be difficult, as we read in A Crack in the Sea. There is fighting, starvation, survival, and leaving what you originally called "home." Finding a home may be difficult when you are in a place of war or you are forced out of the home in other ways. This brings a deeper meaning into home when you talk about being forced out of a home. This book references slaves and refugees finding a new home after being forced out by external forces. They were able to get away by magic, but in reality, there was no magic to help. This book references these difficult conversations in a light-hearted way by bringing in magical elements, but Bouwman does a great job of not taking away the emotions that come with it.
Connecting Diverse Stories Within One Book
Not going to lie, starting this book was difficult because of the constant switching of storytellers and worlds. By the end of the book, I could see why Bouwman made this big decision of including everyone's side of the story. In the First World, both families struggled in different ways, but in the end they all needed to escape. Bouwman was relating two times in history when she mentioned the old tale of the Twins and Thahn and Sang's family. The Twins, Venus and the Swimmer, were originally slaves. While being transported from Africa to be traded, people began to become ill and were thrown overboard to help from spreading the sickness. Little did the white men know that Venus had special powers that could help people walk underwater. They were able to escape slavery and found home in the Second World. This happened in the 1770s.
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In another continent, 200 years later, refugees needed to escape their home of Vietnam during the time of war. Another time in history where a group of people were being attacked based on who they were. Even though the timeline is greatly different, the stories were similar. While trying to find a new home, Thahn, Sang, Mai, Uncle Truc, and Uncle Hung were under attack, almost faced death multiple times, and found magic to enter the new world. A new home doesn't come easily for them, but they were able to escape and find comfort again.
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This is something that could easily be related back to a history lesson within the classroom. Students can talk about the similarities and differences of refugees versus slaves. The concept of why these events were happening were brushed over in the book, but as a teacher we can teach our students the reason for why this was happening and the outcome of it all. This book provides many talking points.
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Use this video as another reference of talking about what it means to be a refugee:
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