The Skin I’m In

Flake, S. (1998). The skin I'm in. New York: Jump at the Sun/Hyperion Books for Children.

Genre: multi-cultural/traditional literature

Age Group: 6^th-12^th grade

Summary:

This is a well-written book about a young girl named, Maleeka Madison.  She attends an inner-city school, McClenton that has a very poor environment for students to be successful.  Maleeka has vey low self-esteem and continually gets made fun of for her dark, chocolate skin and her “hand-sewn” clothes that her mother makes for her to wear.  She gets caught up in many situations due to her inability to stand up for herself and the detrimental social status of a student named, Charlese.  When a teacher by the name of Miss Saunders joins the faculty, she encourages and sees potential in Maleeka, that she feels she is wasting.  She gets her interested in writing; which will ultimately help her with many obstacles that Maleeka is facing.  In the end, Maleeka has to make some powerful choices and decisions; you’ll have to read to find out what she decides to do!

Reflection:

This was a very powerful book and I think even adults should have a chance to read this book, especially educators of middle-school students.  This book is written in first-person point of view from the character, Maleeka Madison.  Through the powerful dialect and the writing itself in the book, you truly see the problems that lie in middle school through decisions that Maleeka makes based purely on “physical fear” as well as “social fear.”  One situation that spoke loudly to me was when Maleeka finally breaks down about Char being the instigator of the classroom fire.  Many people continually ask Maleeka who was apart of the fire and she will not tell and takes all the blame, due to fear.  When she finally breaks down, and yells out at Charlese, she continually says, “Tears roll down my face…I’m rocking and thinking and crying” and the touch of Miss Saunders hugging her tight relieves some of her pain.  Throughout the story, the words are so powerful that you see that no one in the book can help her but herself and it completely saddens you. 

The author also uses the power of a “make-believe” character that Maleeka has made up to “mirror” what she is going through.  This is a powerful message that I think Flake is sending. Maleeka writes diary articles from a slave girl, Akeelma (which is her name pretty much spelled backwords.) She parallels the situations and emotions that she is feeling through this character.  The similes and metaphors in these entries are fabulous!  One of the entries said, “They chain us together like thieves and beat us till we bleed.  I have made up my mind though, I will show no weakness.  I will be strong.  Strong like the sea and the wind.”

Lastly, I enjoyed the organization of the story, in the sense that it had a very powerful message and very serious concepts yet it was written in a way that was easy to read; the chapters where short in length and most chapters told one particular small story of an event.  Each chapter was no more than 5-6 pages. It didn’t seem like a chapter book because it was such a “quick read.”  I highly recommend this book to others; it truly opens your eyes!