STONE RIVER CROSSING, by Tim Tingle

 


Tingle, T. (2019). STONE RIVER CROSSING. Tu Books, an imprint of Lee & Low

Books, Inc.

 

Martha Tom knows better than to cross the Bok Chitto River to pick blackberries. The Bok Chitto is the only border between her town in the Choctaw Nation and the slave-owning plantation in Mississippi territory. The slaveowners could catch her, too. But crossing the river brings a surprise friendship with Lil Mo, a boy who is enslaved on the other side. When Lil Mo discovers that his mother is about to be sold and the rest of his family left behind, Martha Tom suggests they cross the Bok Chitto River and become free.

The Choctaw help the family cross the river and escape the slave catchers. The Choctaw create a miracle--a magical night where things become unseen, and souls walk on water. By morning, Lil Mo discovers he and his family have begun a new life of tradition, community, and a little magic. But as Lil Mo and his family adjust to their new life, they face several dangers.

Lil Mo is charmed by the witch owl, who cast a spell over him.  The only way to get him back is to kill the witch owl.  Funi Man and Koi Losa go after him.  The journey, which leaves its mark on them physically and mentally, ends when they return to Choctaw Town with the body of the witch owl.   They turn it over to Shonti, the medicine woman, to dispose of it safely. 

The danger is not over, because, during Funi Man and Shonti’s wedding, the overseer of the plantation and one of the guards cross the river to get revenge on Lil Mo, his family, and the Choctaws.  In the end, the Choctaw make a deal with the plantation owner, and Lil Mo and his family are no longer fugitives.    

 

Oral histories are how Native Americans kept their history.  In the author’s note of the book, it says: “Archie’s stories (a tribal elder and friend to the author) were documented in the Indian way, told, and retold and then passed on by uncles and grandmothers.  Native Americans live in a world that often accepts the spoken word as the final authority.  Even today, many Choctaws are likely to trust a story told to them by another Choctaw more than anything they read on the printed page.” (Tingle)  Based on these oral histories,  Native Americans actually did help enslaved people gain their freedom. 

 

There are many cultural markers for the Choctaw, African American, and White cultures.  There is one part in the book that brings all of these cultures together;  After Joseph crosses the river for the wedding, he, Lil Mo, and Koi Losa are all walking together “As he walked between his two new friends, Koi Losa smiled in thought.  He looked to his left at Joseph, the son of a slave guard.  To his right walked Lil Mo, the son of slave parents.  And here I walk, he thought, like never before.  We walk together on this sacred day, so different by our skin, yet so alike in so many ways.” 

I am only going to discuss the Choctaw culture markers (excluding my above statement) since Native American culture is the focus of this blog post.  The names of some of the Choctaw in the town are Native American, like Koi Losa, Funi Man, and Shonti.  Some are not Native American, like Martha Tom and Ella, her mother.  There are many Choctaw words throughout the story as well as foods they eat and customs they go by.  One particular custom I found interesting was the wedding ceremonies.  There are several held in the story.  Here is the passage where Martha Tom explains it to Lil Mo: “The music has stopped, and the chase is about to begin.  The chase? I thought we were going to a wedding.   A Choctaw wedding, Lil Mo.  The man chases the woman, and if he catches her, he can marry her.”

 

Publisher’s Weekly: “Richly descriptive and leavened with humor, Tingle’s complex novel offers valuable insights into rarely told history. Ages 8–12.” (May)

I know this is a long review, but I clipped as much as I could without losing the point.

American Indians in Children’s Literature: “My question is: why is the word "worker" used so much in this book? Is it an effort not to use "slave"? There's been a lot of writing in recent years about that word. Instead of "slave" people are asked to use "enslaved" person/man/woman/child so that people are not objectified and so that the institution of slavery is seen as something that people did to other people. 

To work on this review, I listened to a Teaching Tolerance podcast, Teaching Slavery Through Children's Literature. Dr. Ebony Elizabeth Thomas was the guest. There's a lot of hard thinking going on, about how to--and how not to--include slavery and enslaved peoples in children's books! It is a very complex conversation.

As I think about that conversation and the words used in Stone River Crossing, I wonder if Tingle and his editor were having those hard conversations and chose to use workers to avoid objectifying the Black characters in this story? Of course, intent doesn't matter. And, in fact, the word slave appears 52 times (I have a Kindle copy of the book).

What matters is the impact on the reader, and I think that "worker" is like the problem in the McGraw Hill textbook. Stone River Crossing, then, doesn't work.”  Debbie Reese, Sunday, December 15, 2019.

 

This book is an expansion of  his award-winning picture book CROSSING BOK CHITTO ISBN 978093831777

This book by Time Tingle won many awards:

  • Texas Bluebonnet Masterlist. Texas Library Association (TLA)
  • Jane Addams Children's Book Award Honor Book
  • Notable Children's Book. American Library Association (ALA)
  • Paterson Prize for Books for Young People
  • Prairie Pasque Nominee
  • Skipping Stones Honor Award

Tim Tingle is an Oklahoma Choctaw. 

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