I Kick and I Fly

by Ruchira Gupta

Overview

"In I Kick and I Fly, Ruchira Gupta has given young readers an irresistible story, and also one that could save lives. This book is a gift." — Gloria Steinem

A propulsive social justice adventure by renowned activist and award-winning documentarian Ruchira Gupta, I Kick and I Fly is an inspiring, hopeful story of triumph about a girl in Bihar, India, who escapes being sold into the sex trade when a local hostel owner helps her to understand the value of her body through kung fu.

On the outskirts of the Red Light District in Bihar, India, fourteen-year-old Heera is living on borrowed time until her father sells her into the sex trade to help feed their family and repay his loans. It is, as she's been told, the fate of the women in her community to end up here. But watching her cousin, Mira Di, live this life day in and day out is hard enough. To live it feels like the worst fate imaginable. And after a run-in with a bully leads to her expulsion from school, it feels closer than ever.

But when a local hostel owner shows up at Heera's home with the money to repay her family's debt, Heera begins to learn that fate can change. Destiny can be disrupted. Heroics can be contagious.

It's at the local hostel for at risk girls that Heera is given a transformative opportunity: learning kung fu with the other girls. Through the practice of martial arts, she starts to understand that her body isn't a an object to be commodified and preyed upon, but a vessel through which she can protect herself and those around her. And when Heera discovers the whereabouts of her missing friend, Rosy, through a kung fu pen pal in the US, she makes the decision to embark on a daring rescue mission to New York in an attempt to save her.

A triumphant, shocking account inspired by Ruchira Gupta's experience making the Emmy-award winning documentary, The Selling of Innocents, this is an unforgettable story of overcoming adversity by a life-long activist who has dedicated her life to creating a world where no child is bought or sold.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781338825091
Publisher:	Scholastic, Inc.
Publication date:	04/18/2023
Pages:	352
Sales rank:	161,642
Product dimensions:	5.60(w) x 8.20(h) x 1.40(d)
Age Range:	12 - 18 Years

About the Author

Ruchira Gupta is a writer, feminist campaigner, professor at New York University and founder of the anti-sex-trafficking organization, Apne Aap Women Worldwide. She won the Clinton Global Citizen award in 2009, the Sera Bangali Award in 2012 and an Emmy for outstanding investigative journalism in 1996. She has helped more than twenty thousand girls and women in India exit prostitution systems. She has also edited As If Women Matter, an anthology of Gloria Steinem’s essays, and written manuals on human trafficking for the UN Office for Drugs and Crime. Ruchira divides her time between Delhi and New York. I Kick and I Fly is her debut novel.

Editorial Reviews

03/06/2023

As a member of Bihar, India’s disparaged Nat caste, 14-year-old Heera is subject to the tyrannical Ravi Lala, who rules Heera’s neighborhood through fearmongering and money-lending. If Heera remains in school, however, she can avoid being forced into sex work at Lalten Bazaar, or the Girls Bazaar, to help pay off family debts, like many other girls in her cohort. But when Heera is expelled for defending herself from a bullying classmate, her father prepares to sell Heera to Ravi Lala. That is until Rini Di, a hostel owner and martial artist dedicated to empowering young women, steps in—Rini offers to teach Heera kung fu so she can compete in a tournament for a cash prize, a suggestion to which Heera’s parents agree. As Heera betters her fighting skills, she also comes face-to-face with the horrors that girls in her community endure, determining to use her newfound strength to help them. While convenient plotting sometimes requires a suspension of disbelief, debut author Gupta renders Heera’s perseverance amid grueling circumstances via straightforward prose and imbues this searing tale with an ominous ambiance that complements its dark themes. Ages 12–up. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly

"In I Kick and I Fly, Ruchira Gupta has given young readers an irresistible story, and also one that could save lives. This book is a gift." — Gloria Steinem

"Any work from Ruchira Gupta is sure to further the cause of liberating women, especially, and in this novel, girls. It takes a strong belief in us, and especially in our young ones, to persevere as she does in both art and politics. The absolute belief that if the heart is moved, so might be the positive activities for justice and freedom, of the mind." — Alice Walker, author of The Color Purple

"I Kick and I Fly is a powerhouse of a debut. Ruchira Gupta has crafted a page-turner of a read, stepped in place and full of indelible characters, managing to be at once propulsive and enlightening, infuriating and inspiring. But maybe most important, Heera’s story is a beacon of hope to a generation of young people trying to transform an unjust world." — Gayle Forman, New York Times bestselling author of If I Stay and We Are Inevitable

"Having been to the brothels and red-light district I Kick and I Fly so searingly captures, I can testify that this book is essential reading for anyone interested in how to empower girls to break free from intergenerational prostitution and sex trafficking. Ruchira Gupta is nothing less than a great hero, and in her book, she has created one in Heera, as she seeks to defy the destiny of rape that poverty and men have assigned her." — Ashley Judd

"An empathetic and unflinching glimpse into a world little known to outsiders. We watch breathlessly, never sure until the very end how she will kick and punch her way past her circumstances to find her own path to freedom." — Natalie C Anderson

"This book is a call to action, it an invitation for the rest of us to rise from the pall of apathy and join the movement to fight and fight and keep fighting—until we retrieve the last girl from the ugly jaws of the very worst effects of the patriarchy." — Staceyann Chin

“Gupta renders Heera’s perseverance amid grueling circumstances via straightforward prose and imbues this searing tale with an ominous ambiance that complements its dark themes.” – Publisher’s Weekly

"The depth of the story’s details and its themes of bodily autonomy, community, and women’s empowerment reflect Gupta’s experience as the founder of Apne Aap, an NGO working to end sex trafficking... atriumphant debut." - Kirkus Reviews

From the Publisher

2023-01-25
Fourteen-year-old Heera knows what fate awaits many girls growing up in Lalten Bazaar, a red-light district in Bihar, India, commonly known as Girls Bazaar.

Her neighborhood is controlled by gang leader Ravi Lala, who uses predatory loans and the support of corrupt police officers to keep families impoverished and force girls into prostitution. As a member of the marginalized Nat caste, Heera knows many obstacles await her. Her cousin Mira Di was auctioned off by her father to a traveling dance company. When a fight with a bully leads to Heera’s expulsion from school, she knows it will only be a matter of time before her father sells her to Ravi Lala. Fortunately, Heera receives help from Rini Di, a women’s rights advocate in charge of a hostel for vulnerable girls, and joins kung fu lessons at the hostel. As Heera’s strength and self-confidence grow, so does her desire to help the girls and women in her community break free, especially when Heera finds out that her best friend will soon be sold and smuggled abroad. Heera’s narration contains vivid sensory descriptions that, along with the Hindi words scattered throughout, bring the setting to life, quickly immersing readers in her world. The depth of the story’s details and its themes of bodily autonomy, community, and women’s empowerment reflect Gupta’s experience as the founder of Apne Aap, an NGO working to end sex trafficking.

A triumphant debut. (author’s note, resources) (Fiction. 13-18)

Kirkus Reviews