Book review: The First Part Last

Johnson, Angela. (2003). The first part last. New York, NY: Simon and Schuster Books for Young Readers.

She whimpered herself awake which means she only wants to be put in the bed beside me. No diaper change or formula needed. No big screaming fit. She only wants Daddy....

...my heart aches as I straighten out her hands and trace the delicate lines. Then kiss them. Her hands are translucent and warm. Baby hands. Warm, sweet-smelling baby hands. And all I can do is kiss them and pull her closer so she won't see my face and how scared I am.

When there's nothing you can do, do nothing.

But then I realize. I've done it. I know something. I know something about this little thing that is my baby. I know that she needs me. I know what she does when she just needs me.

No big screaming thing.

Just a whimper, then she only wants me...

I always kiss her, my baby, and look into her clear eyes that know everything about me and want me to be her Daddy anyway.

The day Bobby turned 16, he found out that his girlfriend Nia was pregnant. And his world stopped. Days spent at the arcade or basketball courts with his friends turned into days spent with Nia at the obstetrician's office and in the social worker's office as they decide what to do with their baby. They eventually choose adoption. They could then go to college, move on with their lives, and their baby would have a house with a back yard and a dog.

Then at eight months pregnant, Nia goes into a coma. Eclampsia. The doctors say that she will not recover. And Bobby refuses to sign the adoption papers. The baby girl, whom he names "Feather" after the nurse put her "light as a feather" in his arms, was his, and he would take care of her.

This is a very sad but very heartwarming story about a teenage father trying to take care of his child. Bobby's family and friends are amazingly supportive without allowing him to abdicate responsibility (his mother makes a point of telling him, "If she cries, she's yours; your arcade days are over.") While I became a parent for the first time at more than twice Bobby's age and under very different, much easier circumstances, I found the issues that he discusses--the sheer terror of loving someone that much, someone who is completely dependent on you--to be universal.

Angela Johnson has won the Coretta Scott King Award twice and has also authored two Coretta Scott King Honor Books.