Wow! eBook
The Queen of Katwe: One Girl's Triumphant Path to Becoming a Chess Champion
Author(s): Tim Crothers (Author)
- Publisher: Scribner
- Publication Date: October 15, 2013
- Language: English
- Print length: 256 pages
- ISBN-10: 145165782X
- ISBN-13: 9781451657821
Book Description
The “astonishing” (The New York Times Book Review) and “inspirational” (Shelf Awareness) true story of Phiona Mutesi—a teenage chess prodigy from the slums of Uganda.
One day in 2005 while searching for food, nine-year-old Ugandan Phiona Mutesi followed her brother to a dusty veranda where she met Robert Katende.
Katende, a war refugee turned missionary, had an improbable dream: to empower kids in the Katwe slum through chess—a game so foreign there is no word for it in their native language. Laying a chessboard in the dirt, Robert began to teach. At first children came for a free bowl of porridge, but many grew to love the game that—like their daily lives—requires persevering against great obstacles. Of these kids, one girl stood out as an immense talent: Phiona.
By the age of eleven Phiona was her country’s junior champion, and at fifteen, the national champion. Now a Woman Candidate Master—the first female titled player in her country’s history—Phiona dreams of becoming a Grandmaster, the most elite level in chess. But to reach that goal, she must grapple with everyday life in one of the world’s most unstable countries.
The Queen of Katwe is a “remarkable” (NPR) and “riveting” (New York Post) book that shows how “Phiona’s story transcends the limitations of the chessboard” (Robert Hess, US Grandmaster).Editorial Reviews
Review
“A moving and universal story of the power of potential and the wonder of perseverance. This story will inspire you–and will make you wonder how many more Phionas there are among us.”–
Gayle Tzemach Lemmon, New York Times-bestselling author of The Dressmaker of Khair Khana“This story of a young woman’s triumph over the unimaginably cruel fortune she was born into would pierce a heart of stone.”–
Hillary Jordan, New York Times-bestselling author of Mudbound and When She Woke“
The Queen of Katwe is one of the most inspiring, thought-provoking, humbling books I’ve ever read. It’s a must-read for any chess player, woman, athlete, or frankly anyone who knows any of the previous three, aka everyone!”–Siva Sankrithi, Math Teacher & Chess Coach, Lakeside Upper School, Seattle, WA“
The Queen of Katwe is gripping. We witness Phiona’s incredible evolution as a player, as she competes against older and far more experienced competitors. It also offers readers a fascinating look at a war-torn and struggling nation, as well as the unlikely story of how her mentor Robert Katende, a refugee of Uganda’s civil war, has created a flourishing chess program for kids in one of Africa’s most treacherous slums. This story has the power to inspire girls everywhere.”–Alexandra Kosteniuk, Grandmaster, 12th Women’s World Chess Champion (www.chessqueen.com)“Moving…. A poignant reminder of the power of hope.” ―
Kirkus Reviews“
The Queen of Katwe is an extraordinary account of one young woman’s exceptional achievement. It is also a lament for this world in which only a tiny number of incredibly fortunate and exceptionally determined children have any chance of escaping the dehumanizing poverty that prevails in Katwe and places like it.” — Bill Littlefield, host of “Only a Game” on National Public Radio“It’s a story almost too uplifting to believe… Crothers tells Phiona Mutesi’s story in a crisp, reportorial style, but it’s nearly impossible to read the book without a strong emotional response… Inspiring.” ―
Booklist “The Queen of Katwe Tim Crothers gives us an inspiring and heart-wrenching story.” ― Chessville.com“An inspirational profile of an amazing chess player from one of the world’s worst slums.” ―
Shelf Awareness“Phiona’s story … will break readers’ hearts. Phiona’s perseverance, courage, faith, and hope will have the very same readers rooting for her success.” ―
School Library Journal“Part of Crothers’s achievement is his presentation of the terrible circumstances millions of people battle every day to sustain themselves and feed their families, nearly all of them lacking the bright, improbable possibility provided by Mutesi.” ―
The Boston Globe“Tim Crothers powerfully captures the crushing poverty in which Mutesi and herfamily still live.” ―
The Age (Australia)“Phiona’s story transcends the limitations of the chessboard–her life not confined to the miniature pieces that her hand glides from her side of the board to attack her opponent’s king. No, Phiona succeeding at chess, like the fight to become great athletes for so many impoverished people around the world, has been a game for her life.” — Robert Hess, U.S. Grandmaster ―
The Sports Quotient“Riveting.” ―
New York Post“[A] remarkable story.” ―
NPR, “Tell Me More”“Wonderful…. A story of resilience and creativity in the midst of immense need.” ―
ForeignPolicy.com“So compelling… Crothers writes the story matter-of-factly … reserving judgment and bias…. It beckons the reader to wonder at the possibilities that lay before Mutesi, and it reminds us of the harsh reality in which she continues to live.” ―
Charleston Post Courier“Astonishing.” ―
New York Times Book Review“This extraordinary story will stop you and make you want to count your blessings! It confirms how the strength of the human spirit and determination can prevail. Tim’s portrait of Ugandan chess prodigy Phiona Mutesi offers hope and inspiration to all humankind.” — Laura Schroff, New York Times-bestselling author of An Invisible Thread
“Phiona Mutesi is [a] young star…. An incredible story.” — Gary Kasparov, Chess Grandmaster
Review
“A moving and universal story of the power of potential and the wonder of perseverance. This story will inspire you–and will make you wonder how many more Phionas there are among us.”–
Gayle Tzemach Lemmon, New York Times-bestselling author of The Dressmaker of Khair Khana“This story of a young woman’s triumph over the unimaginably cruel fortune she was born into would pierce a heart of stone.”–
Hillary Jordan, New York Times-bestselling author of Mudbound and When She Woke“
The Queen of Katwe is one of the most inspiring, thought-provoking, humbling books I’ve ever read. It’s a must-read for any chess player, woman, athlete, or frankly anyone who knows any of the previous three, aka everyone!”–Siva Sankrithi, Math Teacher & Chess Coach, Lakeside Upper School, Seattle, WA“
The Queen of Katwe is gripping. We witness Phiona’s incredible evolution as a player, as she competes against older and far more experienced competitors. It also offers readers a fascinating look at a war-torn and struggling nation, as well as the unlikely story of how her mentor Robert Katende, a refugee of Uganda’s civil war, has created a flourishing chess program for kids in one of Africa’s most treacherous slums. This story has the power to inspire girls everywhere.”–Alexandra Kosteniuk, Grandmaster, 12th Women’s World Chess Champion (www.chessqueen.com)“Moving…. A poignant reminder of the power of hope.” ―
Kirkus Reviews“
The Queen of Katwe is an extraordinary account of one young woman’s exceptional achievement. It is also a lament for this world in which only a tiny number of incredibly fortunate and exceptionally determined children have any chance of escaping the dehumanizing poverty that prevails in Katwe and places like it.” — Bill Littlefield, host of “Only a Game” on National Public Radio“It’s a story almost too uplifting to believe… Crothers tells Phiona Mutesi’s story in a crisp, reportorial style, but it’s nearly impossible to read the book without a strong emotional response… Inspiring.” ―
Booklist “The Queen of Katwe Tim Crothers gives us an inspiring and heart-wrenching story.” ― Chessville.com“An inspirational profile of an amazing chess player from one of the world’s worst slums.” ―
Shelf Awareness“Phiona’s story … will break readers’ hearts. Phiona’s perseverance, courage, faith, and hope will have the very same readers rooting for her success.” ―
School Library Journal“Part of Crothers’s achievement is his presentation of the terrible circumstances millions of people battle every day to sustain themselves and feed their families, nearly all of them lacking the bright, improbable possibility provided by Mutesi.” ―
The Boston Globe“Tim Crothers powerfully captures the crushing poverty in which Mutesi and herfamily still live.” ―
The Age (Australia)“Phiona’s story transcends the limitations of the chessboard–her life not confined to the miniature pieces that her hand glides from her side of the board to attack her opponent’s king. No, Phiona succeeding at chess, like the fight to become great athletes for so many impoverished people around the world, has been a game for her life.” — Robert Hess, U.S. Grandmaster ―
The Sports Quotient“Riveting.” ―
New York Post“[A] remarkable story.” ―
NPR, “Tell Me More”“Wonderful…. A story of resilience and creativity in the midst of immense need.” ―
ForeignPolicy.com“So compelling… Crothers writes the story matter-of-factly … reserving judgment and bias…. It beckons the reader to wonder at the possibilities that lay before Mutesi, and it reminds us of the harsh reality in which she continues to live.” ―
Charleston Post Courier“Astonishing.” ―
New York Times Book Review“This extraordinary story will stop you and make you want to count your blessings! It confirms how the strength of the human spirit and determination can prevail. Tim’s portrait of Ugandan chess prodigy Phiona Mutesi offers hope and inspiration to all humankind.” — Laura Schroff, New York Times-bestselling author of An Invisible Thread
“Phiona Mutesi is [a] young star…. An incredible story.” — Gary Kasparov, Chess Grandmaster
About the Author
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
When it isn’t flooded, Katwe’s land is packed dirt, fouled by the sewage. Nothing grows there. Stray dogs and rats and long-horned cattle all compete with humans to survive in a confined space that becomes more overcrowded every day. Homes exist wherever someone can find space to construct a makeshift shack, at least until a developer decides that land might have some value and the area is set afire. People are evicted from their dwellings by way of a controlled burn.
In Katwe they say that “running water” is the water you have to run through the slum to get, either from a dirty community well or a fetid puddle. Electricity is far too expensive for most Katwe residents where it is accessible at all. Landlords show up periodically with a sack full of padlocks and anyone who can’t pay the rent is locked out of their home.
Katwe has no street signs. No addresses. It is a maze of rutted alleys and dilapidated shacks. It is a place where time is measured by where your shadow hits the ground. There are no clocks. No calendars. Because it lies just a few degrees from the equator, Katwe has no seasons, which adds to the repetitive, almost listless, nature of daily life. Every day is just like the next. Survival in Katwe depends on courage and determination as well as guile and luck. During Amin’s regime when Uganda suffered through a foreign trade embargo, Katwe became known as a mecca for spare parts. Anything that could be sold on the black market could be found in Katwe, where the people developed a vital resourcefulness amid the squalor.
If you live in Katwe, the rest of the Ugandan population would prefer that you stay there. In the more stable neighborhoods that surround Katwe, homes and petrol stations and supermarkets are patrolled by uniformed security guards with AK-47s. The skyscrapers of downtown Kampala are in view from any dwelling in Katwe, just steps away. Children of the slum venture to the city center daily to beg or pickpocket and then commute back to Katwe to sleep at night.
In Katwe, life is so transient that it is often hard to identify which children belong to which adults. It is a population of single mothers and their kids tossed randomly from one shack to another. Everybody is on the move, but nobody ever leaves. It is said that if you are born in Katwe, you die in Katwe. Death from disease or violence or famine or neglect touches everyone in the slum, yet individual tragedies are not dwelled upon because they occur so frequently. Most of the children of Katwe are fatherless and the men in their lives often beat or abuse them. The women of Katwe are valued by men for little more than sex and childcare. Many women in the slum are sex workers who eventually become pregnant, but can’t afford to stop working in the trade. They must leave their children locked in the shack at night and it is not uncommon for them to return home in the early morning to find their kids have drowned in a flood or died in a fire after knocking over the kerosene lamp they were using as a night-light.
Bishop Mugerwa estimates that nearly half of all teenage women in Katwe are mothers. Due largely to the lack of access to birth control in Katwe and its neighboring slums, Uganda is now the youngest country in the world with an average age of 14 years. The prodigious birthrate produces legions of young children without an infrastructure strong enough to raise them or educate them. Many become homeless and hopeless, with no sense that if they disappeared they would even be missed. Katwe’s youth endure an overwhelming stigma, a sense of defeat, and a resignation that they’ll never do any better than anybody else in the slum. Achievement is secondary to survival. “What we have is children raising children,” Mugerwa says. “It is known as a poverty chain. The single mother cannot sustain the home. Her children go to the street and have more kids and they don’t have the capacity to care for those kids. It is a cycle of misery that is almost impossible to break.”
By the time Harriet Nakku came to Katwe in 1980, the muddle of decrepit shacks overstuffed with people stretched as far as the eye could see in every direction.
All of the frogs were gone.
