Patricia McCormick
Sold
Hyperion
About the
Book
Told in
poetic vignettes, this novel exposes the plight
of a 13-year-old Nepali girl sold into sexual
slavery.
About the Author
Patricia McCormick
is the author of two other novels, Cut
(2000) and My Brother’s Keeper
(2005). To research Sold, she traveled
to India and Nepal, where she interviewed the
women of Calcutta’s red-light district and
girls who have been rescued from the sex trade.
She recently received a New York Foundation for
the Arts Fellowship. Ms. McCormick lives in New
York City.
Suggested Links
http://www.pattymccormick.com/
Backlist
Excerpted from SOLD
by Patricia McCormick
Copyright ©
2006 Patricia McCormick.
Reprinted by permission of Hyperion Books for
Children. All rights reserved.
MATHEMATICS
In the village school
we were taught to add, subtract, multiply,
and divide.
The teacher gave us difficult
problems, asking us to figure
out how many baskets of rice a family would have
to sell to
buy a new water buffalo. Or how many lengths of
fabric a
mother would need to make a vest and pants for
her husband
and still have enough for a dress for her baby.
I would chew
on the ends of my braids while my mind whirred,
desperate
to come up with the answer that would spread a
smile on
her soft moon face.
Here I do a different
set of calculations.
If I bring a half dozen
men to my room each night, and each
man pays Mumtaz 30 rupees, I am 180 rupees closer
each
day to going back home. If I work for a hundred
days more,
I should have nearly enough to pay back the 20,000
rupees
I owe to Mumtaz.
Then Shahanna teaches
me city subtraction.
Half of what the men
pay goes to Mumtaz, she says. Then
you must take away 80 rupees for what Mumtaz charges
for
your daily rice and dal. Another 100 a week for
renting you a
bed and pillow. And 500 for the shot the dirty-hands
doctor
gives us once a month so that we won’t become
pregnant.
She also warns me: Mumtaz
will bury you alive if she sees
your little book of figures.
I do the calculations.
And realize I am already
buried alive.
Copyright ©
2006 Patricia McCormick.
Reprinted by permission of Hyperion Books for
Children. All rights reserved. |
