A local illustrator has collaborated with an author to publish a book about refugee children.
The book, titled “When Water Makes Mud: A Story of Refugee Children,” was published in June 2021 with Blue Whale Press. It follows two refugee girls who flee their home in south Sudan and settle in a refugee camp called Bidibidi in Uganda. The book was inspired by a National Geographic article that detailed children in the Bidibidi settlement in Uganda creating their own toys to play with.
“I noticed that the photographer, Nora Lorek, was on Instagram. I decided to get my courage up, and I private messaged her and told her who I was and that I wanted her to vet the animals that I had put in the story to make sure everything was correct,” Janie Reinart, the author, said. “She was so nice. She sent me back her email. She became my inspiration and my resource.”
Reinart is a children’s book author from Ohio. She is also known for her retelling of “The Ugly Duckling,” which was published by Wonderbooks in 2020. She is a member of SCBWI (Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators), a former Poetry Day Liaison for OCTELA (Ohio Teachers of English Language Arts), a teacher consultant with the National Writing Project (NWP), and a member of the NWP Writers Council.
Alayne Kay Christian from the Blue Whale Press reached out to Morgan Taylor, a Hatfield native, to illustrate the book. Taylor graduated from North Penn High School in 2011. She then attended Arcadia University.
“One of the professors [at Arcadia] had a background in children's book illustration and really took me under his wing and helped me with that,” Taylor said. “This book is kind of like a thank you to all the teachers that I've had who have helped me, given me advice, and put in their two cents.”
Taylor was instantly drawn to the story and its theme of resilience among children.
“Children can go through a lot and also find joy at the same time,” Taylor said. “I felt like I had to help tell the story.”
Christian discovered Taylor after finding her work on Women Who Draw, a website for illustrators to promote their work.
“I am so lucky to have Morgan be the illustrator. She is so wonderful at drawing people and animals,” Reinart said. “She has so much emotion that she puts in the pictures.”
Taylor said she thinks the book is an important story for kids.
“I think it's important for them to see that maybe they can connect, maybe they're going through something, and they can always find that there's joy coming up. There's something that you can always look forward to…” Taylor said. “I think the story is like that of a lot of children in the camp. This is something that not a lot of people know about. It's a story that needs to be told.”
The publisher’s profits are going to UNICEF Uganda. Reinart hopes that, through this book, children in the U.S. can meet children from another part of the world and empathize with them.
“Children hear the word refugee a lot these days, and [the book is] a gentle way of looking at the children from the Bidibidi settlement and how they overcame their own problem by making their own toys,” Reinart said. “It helps stir up the discussion about the plight of the refugee.”
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