Mina's malafa

Juvenile Fiction/Girls & Women
Ages 4-8, Preschool to 3rd
Pages: 40 Hardcover 10x10”
Date Published: October 8th, 2013
Publisher: Schwartz & Wade (Random House)

I am a Christian with a degree in Religious Studies and I think having picture books to introduce children to other cultures and belief systems is important. This would also be fabulous in a Muslim home with a daughter maturing in her faith. Full of vocabulary this story with lovely illustrations follows a Mauritanian (West Africa) girl around as she desires to be like the adult women in her life wearing a malafa (cloth wrap of the Muslim faith). Full of opportunities to show and teach multiculturalism, this book is very appropriate for demonstrating difference in a coming of age experience.

The only issue I had was in the small print/font. Yet I read a digital advanced reader copy and that make vary with the final book.

Lalla sees others wearing a malafa and she wants to join them. She likes the beauty of the malafa, she likes the mystery of the malafa, she likes the queenliness of the malafa. But it is only after she sees the way the malafa helps with faith that she really understands the true nature of the malafa.

Set in Mauritania.