Education: Children's Books: Grades 2 to 7

Blood on the River: James Town 1607 (BOOK): by Elisa Carbone

Grades. 5-8. Following Stealing Freedom (1998) and Storm Warriors (2001), both set in the nineteenth century, Carbone dips further back in U.S. history to the founding of James Town. Young orphan Samuel Collier narrates from his viewpoint as Captain John Smith's page, and the gripping historical fiction reflects Carbone's heavy reliance on primary source material, which she cites in an appendix. The dense particulars of daily life may tire readers who demand high-action plots. Others, though, will be easily caught up in the meticulously drawn scenes, from the fetid ship's hold to the snowy forests where Samuel learns to hunt with Powhatan friends. The cover, showing two crouched Powhatan Indians surveying the settlement, is a puzzling choice, particularly since the British characters are the focus. Still, like Joseph Bruchac's Pocahontas (2003), the text offers a view of Indian life that is far from the Disney stereotypes. An author's note offers more historical contest. A strong, visceral story of the hardship and peril settlers faced, as well as the brutal realities of colonial conquest. –Gillian Engber, Booklist

Night Running: How James Escaped with the Help of His Faithful Dog: (based on a true story) (BOOK): by Elisa Carbone illustrated by E.B. Lewis

Grades 2-4. A boy and dog help each other to freedom in this slave escape tale, which is based on a true story. Young James sadly orders hunting dog Zeus to stay behind while he slips away, but Zeus will hear none of it. Good thing, too, for it’s Zeus that comes to the rescue when men try to nab James in the woods, when the slave catcher’s dogs attack, and when the old canoe in which James tries to cross the Ohio River sinks. Lewis illustrates the flight in impressionistic, full-page or full-bleed scenes that add both detail and incidents to Carbone’s pared-down text to help create a smooth narrative flow. When the Quaker farmer on the free side welcomes the lad but tries to drive the dog away, it’s James’ turn to stand up for a friend, and the two are last seen bedded down companionably together in the man’s barn. –John Peters

Stealing Freedom (BOOK): by Elisa Carbone

"'Papa, is that bad, what Uncle Abram tried to do--steal his freedom like that?' Ann asked.
Her father stopped and stared at her. 'He wasn't stealing anything that wasn't rightfully his,' he said very softly. 'Anyone born a slave gets their freedom stolen the day they're born.'"

Ages 11 and up. Ann Maria Weems was a slave who lived in Maryland in the mid-1800s, and in the engaging, suspenseful novel Stealing Freedom, Elisa Carbone tells her story. As she wrote, Carbone painstakingly pieced Ann's experiences together with old newspaper articles; letters found in boxes in Philadelphia and Ohio; and material culled from rare books, census and land records, wills, and graveyards. She read thousands of pages of slave narratives, and recorded the emotion she heard in these men and women's voices in her own work. The resulting novel--powerful, vivid, and a tale well told--is, according to the author, a combination of what really happened and what could have happened. Every character in her book is based on someone who lived during the 19th century.

The story begins in 1853 at the Price farm in Unity, Maryland, where the Weems family lives and works. Though 10-year-old Ann works from sunup to sundown in often harsh conditions, her life is not an unhappy one, as she is surrounded by a loving family. But the reality of slavery is ever present. When the Prices begin to sell Ann's family off, person by person, her father (a free slave) vows that if the family can't be together in slavery, they will be together in freedom. Finally, only 12-year-old Ann is left on the farm, and young readers will be moved by her courageous journey--from her dramatic escape with a white abolitionist, to her travels on the Underground Railroad, to her heart-wrenching reunion with her family in Canada. –Karin Snelson

Strays (BOOK): by Ron Koertge

Grades 5-7. Sixteen-year-old Ted prefers animals to humans; animals "never lie," and unlike the kids at school, he understands them. When Ted loses his parents in a car accident, he particularly identifies with strays--after all, as a foster kid, that's what he is. Ted lands in a new home, where his basic needs are met by fair but semi-dysfunctional foster parents and where he coexists with Astin, his older roommate, and C. W., who has had 19 placements in six years. Ted also starts a new school, and with Astin and C. W. at his back, he learns to express himself and to rely upon people as well as animals. Ted's two-way conversations with animals may initially surprise readers, but this magic realism effectively emphasizes his emotional withdrawal, and his outsider's observations of human nature are by turns insightful, devastatingly funny, and suffused with loneliness. Though Koertge never soft pedals the horrors experienced by some foster children, this thoughtful novel about the lost and abandoned is a hopeful one, in which some strays find a place to belong. – Krista Hutley

Waiting for Normal (BOOK): by Leslie Connor

Grades 5-7. We’ve seen this situation before: a parent neglects a child, while the child seeks a wider community to find support. Here that child is 12-year-old Addie, who lives with Mommers in a trailer on a busy street in Schenectady after her adored stepfather and half sisters move upstate. Mommers has lost custody of the “littles” because of neglect, and though she and Addie can laugh together, once Mommers hooks up with Pete, she is not much for good times—though she brings the bad times home. Addie finds solace in occasional visits to her sisters and in her neighbors, especially Soula, ill from her chemotherapy treatments. Connor takes a familiar plot and elevates it with smartly written characters and unexpected moments. Addie starts out being a kid who thinks she has to go along to get along, but as Mommers’ actions become more egregious, her spine stiffens. And though Addie loves her time upstate, she is willing to forgo it when the normality she has there is more painful than positive. This is a meaningful story that will touch many. –Ilene Cooper