Mary Slessor: Forward Into Calabar

This book is a wonderful testimony of what God does when we trust in Him. God used Mary to bring peace and civility to a dangerous region in Africa, during a time when men would not dare to enter the interior of the continent. This story should be in every history book.

My 10-year-old and I read this as part of a home school unit on Africa. Mary Slessor is a wonderful role model for kids: scrappy, stubborn in the face of great resistance, and deeply compassionate. She helped West Africans tremendously by opening up inter-tribal trade and, perhaps most importantly, implementing peaceful alternatives to the more devastating and cruel tribal practices. The amazing thing is that she did this through a deep understanding and appreciation of native culture, as opposed to the more typical whites-are-superior-and-Africans-are-savages model of the time. The writing is not perfect by any stretch, but it's a truly great story.