Summary Of Find Me Unafraid

Find Me Unafraid: Love, Loss and Hope in an African Slum is a 2015 nonfiction memoir by Kennedy Odede and Jessica Posner. Kennedy, a Kenyan born in the slums, and Jessica, a privileged white American from Colorado, tell the story of their meeting, romance, and eventual collaboration to build schools and bring change to the slums of Kibera. The title is taken from a line in the poem “Invictus” by William Ernest Henley: “And yet the menace of the years / Finds and shall find me unafraid.”

Kennedy and Jessica alternate narrating chapters of the book. In Part I, Kennedy tells the story of his childhood in Kibera, one of Africa’s biggest and poorest slums, while Jessica talks about her first visit to those same slums, and meeting Kennedy, as a
There are few ways to move up in the world, and survival instincts kick in. A hungry young Kennedy tries to steal a mango from the market, but he is caught and beaten by a mob of angry shoppers. A merciful priest intervenes, saving his life. The priest takes an interest in him, offering to send him to school. This is something Kennedy’s mother would not be able to afford otherwise, and for a while, Kennedy is able to receive an education. But when the priest is transferred, the headmistress kicks the boy out.

Another priest intervenes, but this one is more sinister. Although he sends Kennedy back to school and offers him books to read, he rapes the boy. Kennedy’s sisters are also raped. He suffers shame and pain, but he finds meaning in the books, particularly in the speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr. He realizes that, in King’s words, “everybody can be great...because anybody can serve.”

Kennedy sees his friends beaten to death or killed by the police for stealing. Another friend commits suicide. Still others are castrated and left to die during bouts of ethnic violence. He is surrounded by ugliness, poverty, and death. But books show him a way out. He learns to appreciate the small things around him. And he wants to help his community rise above itself. So with the purchase of a soccer ball, he decides to start a youth empowerment group called Shining Hope for Communities
She is alarmed by the run-down public buses, the dust, the blazing African heat. But she admires Kennedy from the moment she meets him. They connect over their shared love for books and the escape they provide. She is impressed and bemused by his status in the Kibera slums: children flock to him, calling him “Mayor.” Jessica decides to move in with him to experience the slums in full, rather than shield herself from reality. That reality sets in when she finds his house is 10 by 6 feet, with walls of corrugated metal and cardboard boxes, and a door that does not fully close.

Working in Kibera, Jessica realizes the extent of the privileged life she has led, the things she has taken for granted. She realizes that the privileges of her comfortable life back in Denver were the result of chance, and that others have been just as randomly denied those comforts. She also begins to fall in love with