Historically Speaking

Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe New Talent (Author) Award Winner (picked May 2010/JLG date February 2011)  By:  Victoria Bond and T.R. Simon  Candlewick, 2010  978-0-7636-4300-3, Middle Grade Zora Neale Hurston was one of the most important African-American writers in our literary history.  She was an integral part of the Harlem Renaissance and became the only black student at Barnard College.  Most of her childhood was spent in Eatonville, Florida, the first all-black township in the United States.  Authors, Victoria Bond and T.R. Simon have imagined what that childhood and that young girl must have been like for their historical novel, Zora and Me .       Readers of Hurston’s famous novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God , will recognize the young Zora’s imagination and spirit in this middle grade book.  Even readers not familiar with the real Zora will be captivated by the early storytelling abilities of ...

  Sharon Dogar, Houghton Mifflin, 2010, 17.00hb, 341pp, 978-0-547-50195-6, 12 and up Author Sharon Dogar has bravely entered Anne Frank’s annex to tell Peter Van Pels’ compelling story. Readers might be hesitant, as I was, to cross the boundary into such hallowed ground, but it is well worth it.   Dogar has fleshed out the account of the families hiding in the Amsterdam attic during World War II and given us another view of Anne, through Peter’s watchful eye.  She has taken great care to keep events historically accurate, while at the same time providing Peter with a depth unavailable in Anne’s diary.   Dogar tells Peter’s story in first person narrative and begins his tale as he is dying in the camps after being found in the annex.  Readers who followed Anne’s journey along in her diary will feel the same pull and compassion toward Peter.  This can be read as a stand-alone book, but will work as a wonderful companion to The Diary of Anne Fran...