Diane Edgecomb

Looking at our shelf of unreviewed books, we came across this collection in looking for multicultural resources for the current issue of TL. We began this series of tales when this reviewer worked at Libraries Unlimited with a first volume of Hmong tales collected from the Denver Hmong community. Now the series has continued through many cultures of the world. This volume seems very special. Yes, all of us know that Kurds inhabit the north of Iraq because of the war there, but I suspect that few of us or the school children and teens we serve understand anything about their history and culture. In this volume, an excellent team has collected many folk tales of the culture, but the volume is more than that. It begins with a brief history of the culture and peoples spreading over several countries of the Middle East, includes authentic recipes and typical meals eaten by the group before launching into various stories, legends, and folktales. Thus, it is a great place to introduce or have students introduce the culture to the rest of us. An excellent addition to our shelves as an introduction to peoples we need to understand and respect.… (més)