Streetkid In The City
Delphine Jamet

Allen & Unwin 2001
119p pbk $16.95

1-86508-503-0

Street Kid in the City by Delphine Jamet is a collection of short stories that describe events in the lives of Street Kids in Perth.  The stories in this book are based on what people told the author.

The introduction to the book makes the reader immediately aware of the Street Kids challenge just to stay alive and sane.  In the first chapter, entitled On the Streets, the reader is introduced to some of the characters that live on the streets of Perth.  The author is keen to point out that living on the streets is not as bad as people make out, mainly because the freedom cannot be compensated for in any way.   One thing that I found interesting was that the Street Kids actually enjoy being on the streets, and that most of them would prefer the streets to a house of their own.

There are five chapters in total, each of them dedicated to different aspects of street life.  One that captured my interest concerned Life Issues, eg. drugs, alcohol and their relation to crime.

This book is aimed mainly at teenagers, and each of the chapters uses what is known as street talk. This is very easy to understand and it makes the book feel more authentic, because a Streetie is actually writing it.  I thought it was good how the book uses different fonts, and you can instantly tell whether youre reading a biography or whether the author is telling you some background information.

Delphine Jamets book was very entertaining. It was also eye opening and it enabled me to glimpse into the lives of people who live in a totally different world to mine.  I would recommend this book to teenagers and adults, either for pure entertainment or to gain a deeper level of understanding of Street Kids.

Todd, aged 16, Canberra, ACT

Street Kid in the City is a collection of real life short stories, which depict the good, and bad times people endure while living on the streets of Perth.  Delphine Jamet presents these short stories, which are told by street kids, without patronising or lecturing the reader. At times the lack of continuity between the stories makes the book a hard to follow. However, the author presents honest stories about young, homeless people, who were probably more likely to reveal brief snippets, rather than expose entire life stories. Thus instead of handing you each person's story on a platter, the author gives you small pieces and leaves the reader to finish the rest.

I recommend this book to people who care about homelessness, but only if they are willing to work at piecing the stories together for themselves.

Emily, Year 10, Canberra, ACT

Streetkid in the City written by Delphine Jamet, and published by Allen and Unwin, is a novel retelling the stories and lives of street kids living in Perth. It is a realistic book that tells the real stories of these people who live and survive the police, drugs and the city.

This book is appropriate for people aged 14 and up. It is an excellent read, and tells the truth of these street kids, telling us about their lives and the way that they live them on the city streets. I would give this book an 8/10 for readability and the involvement of the reader that it has. The author has written this book to make you, the reader, feel like you know the characters in the novel. I recommend Streetkid in the City to anyone who is looking for a realistic book to read, and find out the truth about street kids.

Amelia, aged 15, Canberra, ACT

This book is set in present day Perth and is a collection of short entries (between half a page and four pages long) of the lives of street kids.

The book doesnt use very exciting language.  Rather, the stories are just a non-personal account that someone would tell you about, or written in present tense.  It shows no emotion as it seems that the street kids are too tough and cant trust anyone.

Others might be shocked or repelled at the idea of street life.  It might help them to understand how street kids think, but also stop them from caring and helping them because the street kids in this book never intend to clean up their act and wouldnt even move into a clean house if you paid for them, clothed them and fed them.

Personally, I think the book used boring language and didnt help me learn anything new as I already had an idea of what happened in a street kids life, although I was introduced to a new, narrow-minded, cold, violent and stupid way of thinking.

I was not impressed because it seems to me now that most organisations are wasting their time on people who really dont care.  I truly believe that people should get licenses for having children and pets as most street people are just uneducated because of their parents.  Those people really are worth more and should be motivated to do something rather than getting into trouble to lessen their boredom.

Keeley, aged 16, Adelaide, SA