Title: Fourmi the Ant
Author: Akshita Kakumanu
Publisher: XlibrisUS
ISBN: 978-1-5434-4794-1
Pages: 24
Genre: Juvenile Fiction
Reviewed by: Beth Adams
Pacific Book Review
With a timeless moral to her story, author Akshita Kakumanu has brought the stress of school, learning and being tested to children by telling it through the eyes of an insect in Fourmi the Ant.
Human society, in many ways, parallels the social structure of the ant hierarchy, with workers and wanders; allowing for example, humans being granted opportunities to people achieving good test results – similarly only those ants smart enough to avoid being crushed by humans can graduate ant school. Ants which fail the basic tests of eating large leaves, carrying twigs or even digging for food are outcast to the grasslands to spend their lives away from the nest.
The stress of preparing for and taking the necessary series of tests in the imaginary ant world gives the main character, Fourmi, a bit of a nervous episode, causing him not to eat and overall having an anxious demeanor. So Fourmi’s parents bring him to an ant doctor, of course, to see what is wrong. After being interviewed, the doctor determines Fourmi is okay, but needs to study for his upcoming tests. Being rejected by his sister to study along with her, he is forced to go about it on his own. Will Fourmi pass the tests? Will he become an outcast to the grasslands? These are the concerns in which readers will empathize with as the story unfolds.
The illustrations in Fourmi the Ant deserve special appreciation. The personified ant illustrations bring the personalities of the mother, sister, doctor and Fourmi, to a child’s imagination by giving the characters subtle details – albeit they all look very much the same because they are all ants. There is one illustration, on page 11, when Fourmi is sleeping on a leaf, which is so intriguing and conveys such peacefulness, in my opinion, it could be framed as art in a gallery. The interleaving of ants and galley text make for a visual storyboard of the sequencing of the details to the fullest by youngsters either reading for themselves or being read this story.
Just as ants are taught to run when seeing a human walking towards them, Fourmi the Ant is definitely a book which will make children “look out” where they step to avoid crushing any ants in the future. As children will learn from Fourmi, hard work and studying pays off, both in the human world and in the ant world.
