Some of That Fierce Urgency of Now: Author Caroline Brewer’s "Darius Daniels: Game On"
The Fort Wayne native will co-host two book signings, March 7 and 11, 2020
“Contrary to some popular notions about children, I have never met a child who wasn’t hungry to learn to read or write about any subject that was shared with them,” Author Caroline Brewer started her interview. “Think that’s just fundamental for us to understand as adults, teachers, community leaders…they are hungry.”
For Brewer it’s all about the delivery, how context and history need to be tailor-made for the occasion. “We have to find ways that work for them.”
It’s a sentiment, she said, that can be found in any public or charter school. “It’s a sentiment that’s out there certainly when it comes to low income in children of color. It’s probably even stronger, when it comes to young black males.”
Brewer’s purposeful retort to fight that sentiment and the very real fact of 2/3 of our nation’s children read beneath their grade level, is “Darius Daniels: Game On,” a musical children’s novel that uses over 10 forms of poetry, raps, riddles, and songs. Brewer’s approach to hold their attention, to acquiesce to them, is to ride the power of language, expanding their vocabulary…to play with words…while telling a cool story. The novel finds the titular Darius, an 11-year-old boy who gets sucked into a video game and is told he can’t escape until he hurts somebody. Cool story.
Brewer will host two book signing events in Fort Wayne:
Saturday, March 7, 2020 Pontiac Branch Library, 2215 S Hanna Street, Fort Wayne, IN 46803, 3:30 p.m. – 4:30 p.m.
Wednesday, March 11, 2020 Wunderkammer Company| 3402 Fairfield Avenue| Fort Wayne, IN 46807, 6:30 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.
Also present will be Karen Wilson-Ama’Echefu, a Harlem-born singer, storyteller, and cultural historian who has studied the poetry flow of African-Americans shaped by the language legacy of 400 years of living in the United States. The two will also talk about a revolution as part of the Let’s Talk About It!: Hueman Stories project initiated by Ketu and Rasamen Oladuwa.
Brewer has been a literary coach and education activist for 18 years. She majored in broadcast journalism at I.U.; her first job was at Channel 15. She wrote for Frost Illustrated, was a columnist at the Journal Gazette. Her last newspaper job was for The Record (The Bergen Record) newspaper from Hackensack, New Jersey, ten minutes from Harlem and all of NYC.
After The Record, her last newspaper job, she moved back to Fort Wayne, and worked regionally with school systems, teachers, and students who she tutored. Brewer told the story of a FWCS student, who read years beneath his grade level, who she tutored for six months in the 6th grade. He became an honor roll student in high school, attributing his success to Brewer’s work. “He taught me patience, resourcefulness, how tap into my drama queen and make reading as interesting and as exciting as much,” said Brewer who moved to Washington D.C. to do just that.
For more info about Brewer (pic on right, below) and Darius Daniels, hit up her website at CarolineBrewerBooks.com or email the author at Caroline@CarolineBrewerBooks.com.
