Jacqueline Woodson's Brown Girl Dreaming has won this year's National Book Award in the Young People's Literature category. Here is a review:
Woodson tells the story of her life against the backdrop of the civil rights movement of the 1960s and 1970s in this fictionalized memoir. Beautifully written in verse, it shows the difficulty of not feeling at home in any one place. Jacqueline was born in Ohio but moves to South Carolina with her mother, brother, and sister at age one, when her parents split. Her grandparents become like mom and dad, especially when her mother moves to New York looking for work. Just as she feels she has found her place in Greenville, her mother moves them to New York with her, where she feels she does not quite belong. When she goes back to South Carolina for the summer, she does not feel quite at home there anymore either As she grows, Jacqueline finds her purpose in the telling of stories, despite her early difficulty with reading. Her proudest moment is when a teacher identifies her as a "writer." Poetry is an excellent vehicle for illustrating her emotions while she tries to make sense of the world that is changing so rapidly around her. She conveys a genuine feel for the experience of African Americans in the era where they are moving from the back of the bus to being accepted everywhere, especially from a child's point of view.
The other four finalists include: Eliot Schrefer's 'Threatened,' Steve Sheinkin's 'The Port Chicago 50: Disaster, Mutiny, and the Fight for Civil Rights,' John Corey Whaley's 'Noggin,' and Deborah Wiles's 'Revolution: The Sixties Trilogy' (book two).
Woodson tells the story of her life against the backdrop of the civil rights movement of the 1960s and 1970s in this fictionalized memoir. Beautifully written in verse, it shows the difficulty of not feeling at home in any one place. Jacqueline was born in Ohio but moves to South Carolina with her mother, brother, and sister at age one, when her parents split. Her grandparents become like mom and dad, especially when her mother moves to New York looking for work. Just as she feels she has found her place in Greenville, her mother moves them to New York with her, where she feels she does not quite belong. When she goes back to South Carolina for the summer, she does not feel quite at home there anymore either As she grows, Jacqueline finds her purpose in the telling of stories, despite her early difficulty with reading. Her proudest moment is when a teacher identifies her as a "writer." Poetry is an excellent vehicle for illustrating her emotions while she tries to make sense of the world that is changing so rapidly around her. She conveys a genuine feel for the experience of African Americans in the era where they are moving from the back of the bus to being accepted everywhere, especially from a child's point of view.
The other four finalists include: Eliot Schrefer's 'Threatened,' Steve Sheinkin's 'The Port Chicago 50: Disaster, Mutiny, and the Fight for Civil Rights,' John Corey Whaley's 'Noggin,' and Deborah Wiles's 'Revolution: The Sixties Trilogy' (book two).
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