This book does a great job at touching on important subjects such as social class and economic status. Maya is made fun of because of the second hand clothes she wears. It is very important for young readers to be aware that not all children are financially well off, and it is not appropriate to ...
Lonnie (Locamotion) and his little sister Lili get separated living in different foster homes after their parents die in a fire. Lonnie decides to write letters to Lili so she won’t forget him while they are living apart. Lonnie lives with Miss Edna, who he loves and her two sons who are in Iraq....
Date: November 24th, 2014Author: Jacqueline Woodson; Illustrated by James RansomeTitle: This Is The RopePlot: Jacqueline Woodson's picture-book features the life of Beatrice, a young African-American Brooklyn-raised girl, her mother and grandmother who left the South, along with 6 million other A...
About a little girl who doesn't want her mom to have another baby. This book is a great book for introducing alternative families because in the book there is no father. Gia and her mother live alone together. Also when her aunts and uncles come over, not all of them are the same race. These dif...
POETRY AND JACQUELINE WOODSONI never thought that I would have liked a book of poetry; but, I loved this book. Like, LOVED it. It was a quick read and it was written from the perspective of an African-American, 11-year-old boy, Lonnie Collins Motion (Lo-co-motion). At seven-years-old, his parents...
"I feel so stretched out. Like I'm broken in a million pieces or something." —Margaret, "Last Summer With Maizon", P. 32 "But I knew she had grown into someone I wasn't. I still love her for who she was, not for who she became." —Grandma, "Last Summer With Maizon", P. 53 "You're my best frien...
A quiet, beautifully etched portrait of a first love that is shattered by the racism, If You Come Softly traces the relationship of two teens whose lives intertwine for a short but life-changing time. Ellie is Jewish and white. Jeremiah is black. Both are from well-to-do families where it's somet...
(NOTE: This review is an excerpt from a graduate level research paper. The rating (stars) and the critical review are mutually exclusive; the former simply pertains to my subjective partiality to the story)Jacuqeline Woodson’s Miracles’s Boys serves as a prime example of a narrative that incorpor...
This excellent YA novel concerns Afeni, who is twelve years old and lives with her mother. Her parents are divorced, and her mother is a recovering alcoholic, but things have been stable for Afeni and she and her mother certainly don't lack for anything -- her mom is also a bit of a workaholic. A...