A Long Walk to Water cover

A Long Walk to Water

Linda Sue Park (2010)

“A true story of survival across two timelines: a boy walks 1,500 miles across a war-torn continent so that, decades later, a girl will not have to.”

EraContemporary
Pages121
Difficulty★☆☆☆☆ Accessible
AP Appearances0
survivalhopeperseverancewatercommunitywareducationconnectionmiddle-schoolHigh School
OverviewSummaryDictionContextSignificanceWhy ReadThemesCharactersQuestionsSimilarCheat Sheet

About Linda Sue Park

Linda Sue Park is a Korean American author born in Urbana, Illinois in 1960. She won the Newbery Medal in 2002 for A Single Shard. A Long Walk to Water (2010) grew from her research into Salva Dut's life and the work of Water for South Sudan (now the nonprofit's name). Park interviewed Salva Dut directly and worked with him to ensure the accuracy of his story. She has been a longtime supporter of his drilling projects. The book's proceeds have supported water well construction. Park has spoken about writing the book as a responsibility: she had access to Salva's story, and that access came with an obligation to share it accurately.

Life → Text Connections

How Linda Sue Park's real experiences shaped specific elements of A Long Walk to Water.

Real Life

Park is the daughter of Korean immigrants who emphasized education as the path out of disadvantage

In the Text

Salva's deep connection to schooling — he is at school when the war begins, pursues education throughout his refugee years, completes college in the US

Why It Matters

Park understands education as both survival tool and identity. Salva's commitment to schooling is not incidental to his character — it is the mechanism of his survival.

Real Life

Park has been transparent about interviewing Salva and fact-checking his account

In the Text

The novel's author's note explains which events are documented, which are Park's reconstructions, and how Salva reviewed the manuscript

Why It Matters

The collaboration model — survivor's testimony shaped into accessible narrative by a skilled author — has ethical implications. Park's transparency about the process is part of the book's argument about whose stories get told and how.

Historical Era

Second Sudanese Civil War (1983-2005) and contemporary South Sudan water crisis

Second Sudanese Civil War (1983-2005) — approximately two million dead, four million displacedThe Lost Boys of Sudan — 20,000+ unaccompanied minors walked to refugee camps in Ethiopia and KenyaKakuma Refugee Camp established 1992 in northern Kenya — housed over 80,000 refugeesLost Boys resettlement program — approximately 3,800 Sudanese boys resettled in the United States beginning in 2000South Sudan independence 2011 — the world's newest nation, created after decades of conflictOngoing water access crisis — roughly 70% of South Sudan's population lacked access to clean water as of the novel's writing

How the Era Shapes the Book

The novel cannot be understood outside its historical context because it IS its historical context — it is the story of specific events (the civil war, the Lost Boys migration, the water crisis) filtered through the experience of specific people. Park does not ask the reader to imagine a fictional war. She asks them to understand a real one through the eyes of one child. The 2008 timeline grounds the historical narrative in a contemporary crisis that the reader can act on — Water for South Sudan is still active, still drilling wells.