To make matters worse, everyone in the house is too busy to spend time with her or talk to her about her worries. As she prepares to leave for a month in Canada, Anna is nervous about spending that much time away from her family. The family rummages through every cupboard and drawer, and doesn’t come up with anything appropriate, so Anna’s big girl cousins decide to take her shopping at the “oyinbo” clothing stores in town, but Anna’s disapproving grandmother has other ideas. That also means she needs some warm clothes. Harmattan time also means that Christmas is coming, and Anna Hibiscus will be going to Canada to visit her grandmother and play in the snow. The twins stage an elaborate escape back outside, where their pursuit of Koko is put on hold when they find an even sweeter treasure. When Grandfather announces it is time to go inside to nap in their air conditioned bedrooms, everyone but the twins is relieved. They are determined to catch Koko, the family’s pet parrot, and steal one of his tail feathers. One hot harmattan afternoon, the whole family is lounging outside trying to stay cool in the shade of the garden -the whole family, that is, except for Anna’s rambunctious twin baby brothers Double and Trouble.

Anna relays this information to her family, and they all agree to try to find ways to help. Anna soon learns that the girls who sell fruit just outside her family’s gate do not have the luxury of bath water, and, in truth, the whole city is suffering from water scarcity. They save their bath water to give their gardens a good long drink each night (which also rinses away the sand). While Anna’s family has plenty of water in their well, they are still careful to conserve. Wind from the Sahara blows sand across their Nigerian home and city, and will continue to do so for four months! Through a series of four stories, readers can follow Anna and her large extended family as they live and work together throughout the harmattan time. She and her little cousins think it means their garden and everything green has died their older cousins quickly reassure them that it is harmattan time.

What did you like about the book? Anna Hibiscus is dismayed to awaken one morning to a hazy brown sky. Rating: 1-5 (5 is an excellent or a Starred review) 4

Love from anna hibiscus