Saturday, June 21, 2008

A Thousand Never Evers by Shana Burg

June 12, 1963

Now get this: there's a boy in Jackson so rich that when he finished high school, his daddy bought him a brand-new car.

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Summary: As the civil rights movement in the South gains momentum in 1963 -- and violence against African Americans intensifies -- the black residents, including seventh-grader Addie Ann Pickett, in the small town of Kuckachoo, Mississippi, begin their own courageous struggle for racial justice.

Publisher: Delacorte Press; 301 pages

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

I did like the way this book was written. It showed the unfairness of Jim Crow laws while not frightening children too much. The supplementary materials did seem somewhat biased.

Kris said...

I loved, loved, loved this book -- Addie is a very believable and wonderful character, her voice comes through strongly in the writing, supporting characters are well-developed, and the storyline is gripping. Good historical fiction for kids not only should be accurately researched, but also needs to make history real, and this book does just that.

Jen said...

I thoroughly enjoyed this book-- I felt like I was right there with Addie. The realistic aspects of the book were deftly weaved into the book. It didn't have a 'first novel' feel to it. (Had to love the spunky librarian too!)

I could easily recommend this book to children who are studying the time period or the civil rights movement; but what's even better is that I wouldn't hesitate to recommend it to someone who wasn't studying those topics, either.

kmg365 said...

Wasn't crazy about this one. I love a book that's meticulously researched, but I don't love it when the research shows through the cracks. The book felt very didactic to me, rather than the "lessons" flowing naturally from the story.

Heather said...

My opinion is somewhere between Jen's and kmg365's. I enjoyed the book, thought Addie was well developed, but everything seemed to fall apart after the trial. The denouement was so weak I actually scanned several pages. Suddenly, I had no interest in the resolution. Possibly this was the sudden - oh, we can stay with our friends - turn of events. Considering everything else that happened & the community, this was too rosy for me to accept. Not outstanding, but good.

Jen said...

I can't believe I wrote 'weaved' and not 'woven' and it took me this long to come back and notice.

Unknown said...

I didn't think I would like this book, but I found it to be very interesting. I thought the Author's note at the start of the book gives just enough background information so kids will have an historical context for the story. I thought the characters were believable liked how Addie's story reflected what was going on in the rest of the country at that time. My one question is about the cover of the book: Why is Addies shown satnding in front of a field of cotton when the stroy was about a vegetable garden?