Solo

1. Bibliography
Alexander, K. and Mary Rand Hess. 2017. Solo. Grand Rapids, MI: Blink. ISBN 9780310761884

2. Summary
Always feeling like he is overshadowed by his former rock star father, Rutherford, Blade Morrison tries to find his own voice by using music as a way to cope. After being humiliated for the last time by his father at his graduation, Blade pushes his father away and causes a fight between himself and his father. His sister, Storm, lets a secret that he never knew out: he was adopted. Wanting to search for his biological mother, the path leads Blade to Africa. Unfortunately, his happiness comes to a halt when his father shows up with a t.v. crew. This does not stop Blade from continuing his journey to meet his mother, and after traveling through the village, he finally comes face to face with her and learns why she made the decision at such a young age. While on this journey to meet his mother, Rutherford falls in love with a villager child, Sia, who he plans to adopt, but all the happiness turns to sadness when she develops Malaria and passes away before he is able to adopt her. Once again, Blade turns to music, and all the village people, along with Blade and Rutherford,sing and dance as a way to honor the village and Sia.

3. Discussion
As soon as I opened the book, I immediately said “ugh, its poetry”. Ever since I can remember, I have not enjoyed reading poetry. I always have a hard time with the “imagery” aspect that poets like to use, and I always find it difficult to relate to characters and their situations when written in poetry. Solo, on the hand, did not leave me with much to “imagine”. In other words, I felt that the “imagery” aspect of the writing is plainly written out as regular text, and I did not have to visualize anything. Not even halfway through the book, I caught myself thinking “this book could have been better if it was written as a regular fiction book,” and I still believe that having finished it. I honestly don’t see how this book is classified as “poetry” other than the fact of how the text is written.

It took me more than halfway through the book to finally enjoy the storyline; and, with that, I don’t think elementary students will be too fond of this book. I don’t think elementary students will be interested in the storyline, but middle or high school students may be interested in reading it.

4. Connections
Although there is a lot of talk about drug addiction, I could see teachers using this book in a writing or reading classroom setting. Being that I have a difficult time seeing how this book can fall under “free verse”, this book can be used as a topic to discuss for a writing/ reading poetry assignment.

Adoption and acceptance are other topics that can be used from the book that a teacher may want to use as discussion points in a classroom setting.

Although I have not read any other books from Kwame Alexander, I have seen a lot of discussion posts and articles about Alexander’s The Crossover, which I read is also a novel written in verse.