The other good news is that it's the first in a trilogy-- so when you finish it (and love it), you can move right on to the next book.
During the summer of 1968, sisters Delphine (11), Vonnetta (9), and Fern (7), are sent from their home in Brooklyn to Oakland, California, to visit their mother. It has been nearly 7years since any of them have seen her. Their mother is a poet who by all indications views her children's presence as an imposition. When they arrive, Nzilla (formerly Cecile) packs them off to a summer day-camp run by the Black Panthers as often as possible. The girls spend their summer making new friends, struggling with their relationship with their mama, learning chants, and painting signs.
I loved this book. Delphine (in whose voice the book is narrated) is endearing and authentic. She carries the burden of looking after her sisters, ever realistic about the amount of support she can expect from her mother (next to none). In the beginning, she is always conscious of not making a "grand negro spectacle," (i.e she and her sisters behaving like normal kids and drawing the ire of white adults around them). However, by the end of the book, when she takes her sisters on a tour of the bay area, she responds to a rude "what do you want?" from a shopkeeper with "We are citizens, we demand respect." (She later observes: "I had that Black Panther stuff in me, and it was pouring out at every turn.")
This book builds a detailed civil-rights era world for readers, while examining the complexities of human and societal relationships, touching on themes of racism, religion, family, resistance, and growing up. School Library Journal said "There are so many ideas floating about in this little novel that you'd think it would end up some kind of unholy mess. Instead, it's funny and painful and just a little bit brilliant."
If you'd like a chance to win a free copy of this brilliant little novel, leave me a comment. Tell me about a book that gave you a greater insight into another time or taught you more about experiences outside of your own reality. I'll choose a winner next Friday.
Happy Reading!
Edited to add: LESLIE! We flipped a coin. You win! Message me your address and I'll get it in the mail.
Comments
Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys opened my eyes to the deportation of Lithuanians and others during the Russian genocide in the Baltic states. I’d never known this happened during the same time as the Holocaust, and it was fascinating to me that the reality of it is debated. My dad’s ancestors were from Lithuania so it really appealed to me.