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Azizi and the Little Blue Bird by Laila Koubaa – YA Books Central
About This Book:
In the Land of the Crescent Moon, the walls have ears.
Azizi lives with Umma and Baba in a country ruled with an iron fist, whose leaders capture all the blue birds and lock them up in a white cage in the courtyard of their palace. While the rulers swell and bulge like hot air balloons, stuffing their stomachs from morning till night, the people shrink and suffer until they are almost invisible.
One day, when Azizi is no bigger than a pine nut in a glass of mint tea, a little blue bird escapes from the cage. Determined to live in fear no longer, Azizi and the little blue bird set out on a journey to free the people of their cruel and greedy rulers and bring peace to the land once more.
This contemporary fairy tale of freedom against oppression is inspired by the Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia.
*Review Contributed By Rachel Feeck, Staff Reviewer*
Fairytale Reflecting on Modern Events
Azizi lives in a little house with an orange tree. He doesn’t like to think of the portraits of Tih and Reni, the scowling rulers who demand increasing tribute from the people, and as their spirits shrink so too do they diminish in size, until Azizi and the others are no bigger than seeds. But when a captive blue bird slips free, with Azizi’s aid, they conquer the tyrants’ greed and set the people free.
In the way of great fables, the tale of Azizi and the little blue bird memorializes real world events and struggles with ordinary characters and a dash of the fantastic. For example, through extorting the people, the tyrants literally swell into giants, a vivid depiction of the seemingly insurmountable odds the ordinary people feel when living under an oppressive regime. Tyrants grow beyond ordinary men, and the people shrink to be less than the dirt beneath their feet, even as they ceaselessly toil to survive. But at the end of the day, the tyrants are only as big as their ambition, and sometimes a single act of courage can be the snowball that starts an avalanche of revolt.
I enjoyed the feel of this modern fairytale and the portrayal of a perhaps lesser-known modern moment in history, the Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia. Vibrant illustrations evoke a desert kingdom both rich and lush, rugged and fantastic, and although the story is light on a personal narrative (Azizi immediately helps the bird without question, without a particular struggle), it captures the desperate hope of a people overthrowing oppression and invites the reader to learn more.