Face Relations: Eleven Stories About Seeing Beyond Color

by Marilyn Singer (Editor)

Why can't a white kid sit with the black kids in the cafeteria? What happens when a biracial girl from Trinidad falls for a guy from a very different culture? How does a teen deal with being the only Palestinian boy or the only Japanese girl in a small American town? Face Relations offers eleven original works by celebrated authors Joseph Bruchac, Marina Budhos, M. E. Kerr, Kyoko Mori, Jess Mowry, Naomi Shihab Nye, René Saldaña Jr., Marilyn Singer, Rita Williams-Garcia, Sherri Winston, and Ellen Wittlinger that explore the possibilities of embracing diversity in a world still rife with bigotry and racism. As editor Marilyn Singer writes in her "...the characters in these stories tear down the barriers that separate us." Their stories may be troubled, funny, sad, or fierce, but all are full of hope. 11 stories about seeing beyond color > "Phat Acceptance" by Jess Mowry > "Skins" by Joseph Bruchac > "Snow" by Sherri Winston > "The Heartbeat of the Soul of the World" by René Saldaña Jr. > "Hum" by Naomi Shihab Nye > "Epiphany" by Ellen Wittlinger > "Black and White" by Kyoko Mori > "Hearing Flower" by M. E. Kerr > "Gold" by Marina Budhos > "Mr. Ruben" by Rita Williams-Garcia > "Negress" by Marilyn Singer

Genres: Short Stories, Nonfiction, Anthologies

240 pages, Hardcover

First published May 25, 2004

About the author

Marilyn Singer was born in the Bronx (New York City) on October 3, 1948 and lived most of her early life in N. Massapequa (Long Island), NY. She attended Queens College, City University of New York, and for her junior year, Reading University, England. She holds a B.A. in English from Queens and an M.A. in Communications from New York University.

In 1974, after teaching English in New York City high schools for several years, she began to write - initially film notes, catalogues, teacher's guides and film strips. Then, one day, when she was sitting in the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, she penned a story featuring talking insect characters she'd made up when she was eight. Encouraged by the responses she got, she wrote more stories and in 1976 her first book, The Dog Who Insisted He Wasn't, was published by E.P.Dutton & Co.

Since then, Marilyn has published over seventy books for children and young adults. Her genres are many and varied, including realistic novels, fantasies, non-fiction, fairy tales, picture books, mysteries and poetry. She likes writing many different kinds of books because it's challenging and it keeps her from getting bored. She has won several Children's Choice and Parents' Choice Awards, as well as the following: the Creature Carnival, Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award Honor Book, 2005; I Believe in Water: Twelve Brushes with Religion, New York Public Library's "Best Books for the Teen Age," 2001; Stay True: Short Stories for Strong Girls, Popular Paperbacks for Young Adults, 2000 (YALSA); On the Same Day in March, Booklist's Top Ten Science Books of 2000; NCSS-CBC Notable Book, 2000; Deal with a Ghost, finalist, YA category, Edgar Award, 1998; It Can't Hurt Forever, Maud Hart Lovelace Award, 1983; The Course of True Love Never Did Run Smooth, ALA Best Book for Young Adults, 1983; Turtle in July, NCTE Notable, N.Y.Times Best Illustrated and Time Magazine Best Children's Books of 1989; Turtle in July was also a Reading Rainbow review book.

Marilyn currently lives in Brooklyn, NY, with her husband Steve; their standard poodle Oggi, a cousin of their beloved and recently departed poodle Easy, seen in the home page photo; a cat named August ; two collared doves named Jubilee and Holiday; and a starling named Darling. Her interests include dog training, reading, hiking, bird-watching, gardening, meditation, playing computer adventure games and going to the movies and the theatre. She's also a major Star Trek fan.

Reviews

[Alyssa]

Alyssa Morres
Short Stories

This book talks about all the struggles that races go through when looked at by other races. There are eleven stories in this book and they deal with things from being the only kind of different race in a town to dating someone from another culture. Great book to see the truth in the things that happen because of race. I would definitely recommend it, it's a huge eye opener on the issues that we are still faced with today.

[Jill · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading short stories is like eating a potato chip--if they're good, you can't just stop with one. These are good and unexpected. Some of the stories are pretty serious, especially the last one, Negress. But several have humor and most have a lot of guts. Each author interpreted the theme in a different way. I appreciated the satisfying endings, though they did leave me wanting more--I did not want to say goodby to several of the characters.

[Richie Partington · Rating 5 out of 5]

13 May 2004 FACE RELATIONS: ELEVEN STORIES ABOUT SEEING BEYOND COLOR edited by Marilyn Singer, Simon & Schuster, June 2004, ISBN: 0-689-85637-7

"It seems to me as though I've been upon this stage before
And juggled away the night for the same old crowd"
--Al Stewart, "One Stage Before"

"Then Brandon wondered how he should react. The other students were watching him, too. He felt as if he was up on a stage and no one had told him what part to play. This massive black boy was invading his space on the very first day of high school, dammit! It felt like his cool was a house of cards and this woolly black mammoth was shaking the floor. Brandon had gone to a private school from kindergarten through junior high, so he didn't know anyone here. He had no posse to take his back and validate his coolness permit. He remembered something his father had said about making career decisions. Nobody would dis him for dissing this dude, but they'd probably dis him for not. And they'd have him under a microscope for all this freakin' period. Observer, hell! he told himself; he was the one who was being observed, scanned, filed and categorized, labeled and tagged for the next four years by how he treated this huge black kid within the next forty minutes!"
--from "Phat Acceptance" by Jess Mowry

Last November 18th Shari's middle school participated in Teaching Tolerance's "Mix It Up At Lunch Day." While students in other, tougher places--where they truly fear for their personal safety at school--might scoff at our earnest and enthusiastic efforts to have students get to know kids in some of the "other" groups on campus, we certainly have testimony from students who are intimidated and discouraged by the barriers they perceive between groups.

(Not that all of them are convinced those barriers are at all breeched by having a "Day." Said one girl:
"Do adults really think that a bunch of preps wearing stickers is going to change anything? It's a sweet thought, the effort of a true optimist, but they need to GROW UP! It's all bull--stickers do nothing and the high hopes of optimistic adults are the laughing stock of the teen world.")

" 'Well, I'm sorry, DeMaris, but you cannot eat at our table!'
" 'Why?'
" 'Because it makes everybody uncomfortable. Can't you tell that?'
" 'Yes. But I still don't know why. We were best friends for six years. How come all of a sudden you can't even sit at a lunch table with me?' Just saying it out loud made the sadness bunch up at the back of my throat, making my voice sound thick."
--from "Epiphany" by Ellen Wittlinger

But I expect that a number of those students will ease up on their cynicism after experiencing FACE RELATIONS, a stellar collection of short stories about the "relations" part of race relations. Written by some great YA authors who are, themselves, from a multiplicity of family backgrounds, and utilizing the wisdom of their own firsthand experiences within the changing American social structure, their fictional tales probe the subtleties and complexities that arise amid the interactions of variously hued adolescent characters in today's world.

"Sometimes I'm right and I can be wrong
My own beliefs are in my song
The butcher, the banker, the drummer and then
Makes no difference what group I'm in"
--Sly & the Family Stone, "Everyday People"

"When you go to a high school in a town so small that you have to look twice to see it when you're passing through, everyone knows who you are...That's especially true in school, where you've been with the same kids ever since you were in preschool together. As a result, they remember the time when you were five and you got yelled at by the teacher and expelled for a week because you bit a certain girl in the butt so hard that you left tooth marks."
--from "Skins" by Joseph Bruchac

Yes, the collection contains a wealth of humor, alongside the tension, and the questions posed by the stories. You can add Jess Mowry's hysterically funny leadoff piece, "Phat Acceptance" to my all-time Best of the Best short stories list. Not only a crackup with its Goths, Geeks, and Surferdudes, it also teases us with an intriguing little slice of history, as does Ms. Singer's own provocative piece, "Negress."

"Everyone is changed
Everyone is still the same
They can't get out of the game"
--Todd Rundgren, "Black and White"

"It gets worse. The girls are on me, something bad. 'You think you something special, huh? Little brown girl with straight hair showin' up the brother, huh? Who you think you are?'
" 'Just let me go,' I beg, pressing my books to my chest. I angle through them, but it is all pinches and shoves; my scalp burns needles from where they pull my hair. 'Runnin' to your mama?' they taunt. Please, I think, let me go. Let me disappear into my down jacket and be no different. I tie up my hair in a bun, but in math class a girl pokes it with a pencil and starts hissing, 'Chinky girl now?' "
--from "Gold" by Marina Budhos

The book is prefaced with a letter from the Outreach Director of the Southern Poverty Law Center (the folks responsible for Teaching Tolerance and "Mix It Up At Lunch Day"), which nudges us with, "What unwritten rules limit our ability to enjoy new experiences, explore new cultures, and to make new friends? Once you identify those rules, break them."

FACE RELATIONS provides ammunition for readers to do exactly that, stocked as it is with new perspectives galore, as its variety of teen characters reevaluate their relationships with peers and reconsider their feelings about who they, themselves, are and where they've come from. A fine sense of realistic optimism weaves through the collection, leaving us feeling hopeful at the end of each story.

"My eyes burn into him. For a moment, his dark pupils become video screens and Emmaline and her pain flash across the bridge of his nose. The time I spent working on that story, interviewing Emmaline and all the others, carrying their pain around in my notebook, gave me a companion. They talked about feeling scared and unsafe. I feel scared and unsafe all the time.
"All the time."
--from "Snow" by Sherri Winston

Thoroughly entertaining, and consistently thought-provoking, FACE RELATIONS will serve superbly as both a component within a middle school short story unit, and as a prelude for catalyzing change for the better among diverse middle school students.

Richie Partington, MLIS
Richie's Picks http://richiespicks.com
BudNotBuddy@aol.com
Moderator http://groups.yahoo.com/group/middle_... http://slisweb.sjsu.edu/people/facult...

[sjams · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ten years ago, I would have been, "this is great, I'm glad people are talking about race this way." Ten years ago, however, I was younger and hadn't interrogated my whiteness yet. The editor hasn't interrogated her whiteness, either, and some of the stories come from that point of view. On the flip side, a lot of the stories *are* by POC and are gentle stories about kids trying to figure out race in a world that doesn't like POC. It's just not a very sophisticated collection, and that's okay, because it's a good collection for middle graders who are just starting to understand the complexities of race in our society. I'm just not that audience. (Oh gosh, that would have been 20 years ago for me. Whoops.) So it's not a book for adults who are looking for more complex ways to try to understand race.

[Kayla Voissem · Rating 2 out of 5]

A few good stories, but most were uninteresting.

[Seung Min Baek · Rating 4 out of 5]

Friday, November 7, 2014

In this book, the author has neat descriptions. Initially, a character is described in a specific perspective of another, and is also included with some figurative languages. Brandon was portrayed, "If cool was a sun, then he was a planet, not shining himself but reflecting the rays. At age fourteen he was a average height, with silky blond hair, in a central part, that flowed down over his chest and back like a feral young prince in a sorcery game" (Singer 4). Subsequently, the author specifies the characters' feelings by using vivid comparisons. For example, "He felt as if he was up on a stage and no one had told him what part to play" (Singer 6). Therefore, Marilyn Singer helps the readers visualize what they are reading by giving meaningful expressions.

People with different race and "color" are portrayed throughout this book. First of all, the language used by the characters show that they are differentiating people by skin color. As an example, "He saw how King allowed African-American students to get privileges that Caribbean blacks, not to mention white or Hispanic students, couldn't get" (Singer 47). Secondly, there are stereotypes that certain group of people think about the others. It was written, "A teacher at school told Sami there was an Arab family living far out on a ranch, raising cows" (Singer 71). This is a stereotype because the teacher thinks that Sami is related to this family because he is an Arab too. The teacher also thought of Arabs as farmers and merchants. Hence, race is an important theme in this book.

The book itself is divided into 11 stories. Primarily, each story has a topic about seeing beyond the color. For example, there was a story that about an African boy that was mistreated because of his skin tone and his physical traits. His classmates could obviously not see someone beyond their color. Secondly, the title of the stories are relevant to the actual story. For the section of "skins", the story was about people who had different skins, such as Africans, Asians, and Americans.Thus, there are eleven stories that make up this book.

[Carmen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading the variety of stories created by people of all backgrounds. Although some of the stories are fictional, many readers can relate to them regardless of what color they are or what background they've come from. I would use this book in a high school setting to discuss moments of feeling isolated, or mistreated, neglected, etc. This book would be a good choice for a creative writing class or an English class in high school. Certain stories can be selected either by the teacher or reader and discussed in class.

[Shelfari · Rating 3 out of 5]

there were several short stories compiled in one book....it depicts racism very truly and shows how some people still struggle in life to overcome it...the stories initially and the last one didn't really interest me...i was rather skimming through them...but others i felt were more poignant....like epiphany...which showed how different races could break friendship....a quote tht i'll never forget it one from skins by joseph bruchac that said in the very end, "Whoever you are is real enough. Underneath our skins, everyone's blood is red." The book overall was a good read.

[Alison · Rating 3 out of 5]

Let's face it, in any anthology you know the stories are going to be a mixed bag. Some will shine brightly, and others will be dull and boring. Thankfully, these were mostly good ones. I agree with the preface: "This is not about prejudice, although prejudice certainly plays a part, but about diversity." As we celebrate the 4th of July, I hope we remember to celebrate the great diversity our country has.

[Katie J Schwartz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some of the stories were good, others were so-so. My favorite was "Epiphany" by Ellen Wittlinger.

[Sagine Maitre · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is amazing. It has lots of emotins and race even cultures.

[Thorn MotherIssues · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some very good stories, some very banal stories. Not bad for the target age group, though it seemed to have a slant toward a presumed white reader.

[Monta · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really good youth race/ethnicity relations stories. Quick read, and i enjoyed it.

[Elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked some of the short stories more than others.