The Blue Notebook by James A. Levine

Title: The Blue Notebook
Author: James A. Levine
Type: Audiobook
Narrator: Meera Simhan
Genre: Fiction
Series: No
Copyright: 2009
Publisher: Random House Audio
Rating: 4 out of 5

Summary: from GoodReads

Dear Reader:

Every now and then, we come across a novel that moves us like no other, that seems like a miracle of the imagination, and that haunts us long after the book is closed. James Levine’s The Blue Notebook is that kind of book. It is the story of Batuk, an Indian girl who is taken to Mumbai from the countryside and sold into prostitution by her father; the blue notebook is her diary, in which she recalls her early childhood, records her life on the Common Street, and makes up beautiful and fantastic tales about a silver-eyed leopard and a poor boy who fells a giant with a single gold coin. 


How did Levine, a British-born doctor at the Mayo Clinic, manage to conjure the voice of a fifteen-year-old female Indian prostitute? It all began, he told me, when, as part of his medical research, he was interviewing homeless children on a street in Mumbai known as the Street of Cages, where child prostitutes work. A young woman writing in a notebook outside her cage caught Levine’s attention. The powerful image of a young prostitute engaged in the act of writing haunted him, and he himself began to write.


The Blue Notebook brings us into the life of a young woman for whom stories are not just entertainment but a means of survival. Even as the novel humanizes and addresses the devastating global issue of child prostitution, it also delivers an inspiring message about the uplifting power of words and reading–a message that is so important to hold on to, especially in difficult times. Dr. Levine is donating all his U.S. proceeds from this book to help exploited children. Batuk’s story can make a difference.


Sincerely,


Celina SpiegelPublisher


Feelings: 
This was a powerful book. Long after you finish reading it you will find yourself thinking about Batuk and wondering if there was anything she could have done to have ended up not on the street of prostitutes at the age of nine. She is literate which one would think would have given her an edge others wouldn't have had. This is a story of hardship and imagination.

Batuk is a very strong character and as she writes her story first in secret and then on the street while waiting for customers we get to know her way of thinking and the way she deals with what has happened to her. She has ways of referring to sex to make them less haunting to a child. She calls it baking sweet cake and she brags that she is better at making sweet cake than the other girls.

James Levine creates a magical voice of a 15 year old girl who is still a child in many ways yet is acting in a very adult manor. The voice seems very true and while the story is at times heart breaking. It is a book worth listening to as the story is of a world that isn't familiar to most of the western world. 

The reason I have given this story a 4 out of 5 instead of a 5 is that the ending didn't really feel like an ending to me. 

I recommend this book to anyone that is interested in the hidden lives of the developing world.