The Skin I'm In

Locker doors slam, backpacks hit the floor, and flirtations and insults are traded in echoing public middle school hallways. While these background sounds are not actually present in this superb recording, it's easy to imagine the inner city setting through the characterizations created by narrator Sisi Aisha Johnson. The story focuses on the relationship between 12-year-old Maleeka Madison, whose dark skin and secondhand clothes draw much teasing and torment, and her English teacher, Miss Saunders, whose disfigurement brings its own negative attention from students. Johnson goes beyond delivering dialogue. She gets beneath the skin of Flake's complicated characters. M.M.O. (c) AudioFile 2005, Portland, Maine