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THE LOWDOWN: Shyima Hall was born in Egypt on September 29, 1989, the seventh child of desperately poor parents. When she was eight, her parents sold her into slavery. Shyima then moved two hours away to Egypt’s capitol city of Cairo to live with a wealthy family and serve them eighteen hours a day, seven days a week. When she was ten, her captors moved to Orange County, California, and smuggled Shyima with them. Two years later, an anonymous call from a neighbor brought about the end of Shyima’s servitude—but her journey to true freedom was far from over. A volunteer at her local police department since she was a teenager, Shyima is passionate about helping to rescue others who are in bondage. Now a US citizen, she regularly speaks out about human trafficking and intends to one day become an immigration officer. In Hidden Girl, Shyima candidly reveals how she overcame her harrowing circumstances and brings vital awareness to a timely and relevant topic. FIRST IMPRESSION: Everyone has a defining moment in his or her life. For some it is the day that they get married or have a child. For others it comes when they finally reach a sought-after goal. My life, however, drastically changed course the day my parents sold me into slavery. I was eight years old. —Hardcover edition SNAPSHOT: It would feel inappropriate to say that Shyima Hall was fortunate to have been rescued from her bondage to a callous and entitled rich Egyptian couple—for that would neglect how disgusting those people are for having held her in the first place. More then, it is the reader who is fortunate that Shyima was finally freed from her captors after years of forced labor in Egypt and then nearly two years of domestic servitude in the United States. That the audience might learn from how she interacted with her captor family and the world around her—or didn’t interact as the case may have been—is only possible because of Shyima’s strength to persevere and have her story told. The pared-down prose will be accessible for a wide variety of readers, though anyone looking for gory details should kindly look elsewhere. Shyima’s story is not one of sensationalism, rather one of fact, emotion, and honesty. More sensitive readers may find the harsh details of Shyima’s time as a child slave to be distressing, but that is perhaps the best reaction to have to such a crime. No doubt some will be curious to follow Shyima’s progress towards her goals of joining law enforcement and becoming an ICE agent. She is sure to make many fans, and hopefully many more that open their eyes to the very real and scary world of human trafficking around the globe. Appropriate for ages 12+. Gross child neglect, some physical violence, emotional trauma, and intense situations. Deals with slavery, human trafficking, abuse, identity, chosen family, and faith.
THE ESSENTIALS: (Review copy provided by Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers.) |