Press Room

Faces of Children You Won't Forget

MEDIA CONTACT: For high-resolution photos, review copies, or to schedule interviews, please contact Ruthann Richter, (650) 725-8047, info@facetofaceafrica.com.

Thirteen-year-old Esther Ipeche stoops low over a charcoal fire on the dirt floor of her family's tin shanty, stirrying maize meal into water for the family's only meal of the day. Her withered mother, Susan, lies on the lone bed in the closet-sized hut, barely able to lift her head without help. Her life is slowly being drained by AIDS.

Esther's story, both heartbreaking and hopeful, is among those that unfold in the pages of Face to Face: Children of the AIDS Crisis in Africa. The book is the first to combine narrative and photography to document the impact of the epidemic on children, offering a moving portrait of life in Africa in the shadow of AIDS. The book captures the hopes and heartaches of children who have lost parents to the disease or are coping with HIV infection themselves. It serves as a reminder of this forgotten generation, the millions of orphans and vulnerable children who have been largely overlooked in the world's response to the pandemic.

"This book brings these issues to the forefront, providing seldom-seen and poignant portraits of the lives of children in sub-Saharan Africa who are growing up in the world of AIDS," Peter Piot, MD, former Executive Director of UNAIDS, writes in the foreword. "These are remarkably resilient youngsters, children with the faces of hope, carrying on in the face of daunting loss and economic deprivation."

The book carries a message of hope and serves as a call to action, illustrating how simple actions can change the course of a child's life. All proceeds from the book will go to support children in Africa.

"These beautiful faces will remind you of children you love," said Helene Gayle, MD, MPH, President and CEO of CARE USA. "And their stories show what's possible when we care enough to stand up for them."

The book is the product of multiple trips to Africa by Richter, an award-winning medical writer, and documentary photographer Karen Ande. The two, longtime friends from their Stanford University graduate school days, first traveled together to Kenya in 2004. There they became gripped by the human devastation of AIDS, particularly its traumatic impact on children. They resolved to help bring the issue to public light and to raise funds for grassroots organizations supporting affected children and their families.

Richter is a veteran, award-winning journalist who has been covering AIDS since the early days of the epidemic in the 1980s. Ande has been chronicling the AIDS epidemic in sub-Saharan Africa since 2002. She has been profiled on ABC and in the San Francisco Chronicle for her work on behalf of Africa's children.

Read articles and reviews about the book.

The book is a release of Hope Publishing House in Pasadena, CA.