Yummy:
the Last Days of a
Southside Shorty
A
middle-grade graphic novel by G. Neri
Illustrated by Randy
duBurke
ISBN-13:
978-1584302674
Graphic fiction.
ages 12 & up
from Lee & Low Books
Book Trailer for
YUMMY
In
August of 1994, 11-year-old Robert “Yummy”
Sandifer—nicknamed for his love of
sweets—fired a gun at a group of rival gangmembers, accidentally
killing a
neighborhood girl, Shavon Dean. Police searched Chicago’s
southside
for three days before finding Yummy dead in a railway
tunnel, killed by members of the drug gang he’d sought to
impress. The story
made such an impact that Yummy appeared on the cover of TIME magazine,
drawing
national attention to the problems of inner city youth in America.
YUMMY:
THE LAST DAYS OF A SOUTHSIDE SHORTY relives the
confusion of these traumatic
days from the point of view of Roger, a neighborhood boy who struggles
to
understand the senseless violence swirling through the streets around
him.
Awakened by the tragedy, Roger seeks out answers to difficult
questions—Was Yummy a killer or a victim? Was he
responsible for his actions or are others to blame?
What
Roger learns proves to be a puzzle of contradictions. Some say Yummy
was a thug who
deserved
what he got. Others remember a sweet kid that liked candy and watching the
Little Rascals. Neighbors blame his abusive parents for turning
Yummy into a
monster. The media blames the state system that turned him back out
onto the
streets time and time again. Politicians blame the laws that allowed
gangs to use minors to commit felonies because they can’t be
convicted as
adults. Confronted
with a blurry reality, Roger attempts to understand it
all— including his own
brother’s involvement in the very gang that killed Yummy.
At
Yummy’s funeral, Roger feels the senseless weight of Yummy and
Shavon’s deaths.
As the minister looks out on the crowd, he bluntly implores them to
“Cry if you
will, but make up your mind that you will never let your life end like
this.”
In the end, Roger, like the reader, is left to decide for himself what
truths can
be learned from life and death of Yummy Sandifer.
Reviews:
 (starred review)
"A haunting,
ripped-from-the-headlines account of youth gang violence in Chicago
provides
the backdrop for a crucial mediation on right and wrong. A
much-needed
look at the terrifying perils of life on the margins that will have all
readers
pondering the heady question of moral responsibility." --KIRKUS
(starred
review)
"A harrowing
portrait... Yummy will earn both the reader’s livid rage and deep
sympathy, even as the social structure that created him is cast, once
again, as America’s undeniable shame. This is a graphic novel
that pushes an unsightly but hard to ignore socio-political truth out
into the open." --Booklist
(starred
review)
"Yummy [is] something
entirely new. Gritty, real, willing to ask tough questions, and willing
to trust that young readers will be able to reach their own conclusions. This is a story that
needs to be told and it needs to be told to kids. Believe me,
you’ve nothing like this in your collection. Better get it while
you can."
-- School Library Journal
"Neri's
straightforward, unadorned prose is the perfect complement to DuBurke's
stark black-and-white inks; great slabs of shadow and masterfully
rendered faces breathe real, tragic life into the players. In the end
readers are left with troubling questions and, perhaps, one powerful
answer: that they can choose to do everything in their power to ensure
that no one shares Yummy's terrible fate." --Publishers Weekly
"It
should be a required read. Expect to be angered and disturbed. Yummy
grabs at your chest with barbed-wired fingernails and won’t let
you go easily."
--James Carter, PhD., EN/SANE WORLD
"It's
gritty, it's honest, and it's devastating. And it's also SO important.
Kids need to read this book and see what can truly happen when certain
choices are made." -- A
Patchwork of Books
"This
is a work that demands discussion. Prepare for a story that
won’t easily let you go. Highly Recommended." --Linus's Blanket
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How Yummy came about
“Sometimes
stories get to you; this one left my stomach in knots. After
three days of reporting, I still couldn't decide which was more
appalling: the
child's life or the child's death."
This quote
from Jon Hull of TIME magazine pretty much summed up my feelings about
Yummy. I
remember when the story first broke. It was the September of 1994 and I
was
teaching in a classroom in South Central Los Angeles. I had been
working with
“problem” kids—some kids came from broken homes, some
had siblings or parents
in jail or some had family members who had been killed in the gangs
wars that
seemed everywhere at the time. More than a few of times, I heard an
announcement
come over the P.A. system for a memorial service of a student who had
been
killed.
I
remember
following Yummy’s story day-by-day. A couple of the students had
heard about it
and we argued about whether he was a victim or a bully. A few days
later, when
Yummy was found dead and all the facts came out, I wasn’t sure
who the bad guy
was. There were no winners in this story, only losers.
I
couldn't get the story out of my mind, so I wrote about it. A few
similar tragedies happened within a few months of this incident, all in
the Southside of Chicago, all involving juvenile boys that ended in
death. What came out of me was a movie script I wrote called Lil' Killers , which
was a sprawling look at three of these incidents intertwined over a two
month time period all within a few miles of each other. The script was
a finalist for the Sundance Film Lab and was probably the best thing I
had written to date. But everytime I thought about making it into a
film, something stopped me. Film is such an immediate and visceral
medium that would surely earn an R rating, cutting off the young people
who needed to see this story.
The
end result is I kept searching for a different way to tell the tale of
Yummy,
one that might have positive ramifications. After many years and many
false starts in mediums that ranged from theater to art installations
to short stories, Yummy (one
of the stories from Lil' Killers) found
it's way to being a graphic novel. It seemed like the
perfect way to reach young males --reluctant
readers might read comics and if I was lucky, I'd get them right at
that prime age where they might be making these life decisions about
whether to join a gang or not. I didn't want to hit the reader over the
head with it (just say no to gangs!)
but I felt in just telling Yummy's
story simply and without a heavy-handed moral lesson, they could decide
for themselves what lessons there were to be learned. I wanted to plant
seeds, just enough to start an
internal discussion when a young person was confronted with joining a
gang. Maybe that seed of doubt might bloom into
something positive.
My
hope is that Yummy will
find its way into classrooms, libraries and
into the hands of reluctant readers. This is a story that needs to be
talked about and I hope that Yummy
is just the starting point for a
deeper, more meaningful discussion with young people all over this
country.
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