Tween Black Panther lit! Three kids travel to Oakland for the summer to stay with their estranged and unmotherly mother. She sends them out every day to Black Panther breakfast and summer camp while she stays home and writes poems for the revolution. The story is told from the oldest girl's point-of-view. At 11, and motherless for most of her life, she takes care of her younger sisters and is fearful about hanging out with the Panthers. Still, she takes in their message, and it makes her stronger. Not that she wasn't plenty strong already. Delphine is a nuanced and believable character, as are her sisters. I loved the tidbits defining African-American kids lives in the 60s/70s, them counting black people on television and how many lines they had, encountering white hippies in the Haight and Teutonic tourists in Chinatown, and most of all their getting to see the BPP as an aid organization.
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c-dog (not verified)
Thu, 08/26/2010 - 3:15pm
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Glad you weren't
Glad you weren't disappointed. Newbery this year--mark my words.
sladjana (not verified)
Fri, 10/08/2010 - 10:01pm
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thank you so much for
thank you so much for recommending this book it was superlative! am going to read every single book by this author.
vikki (not verified)
Mon, 05/23/2011 - 1:25pm
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I don't remember if you
I don't remember if you recommended this, if I saw it here and filed it away in my messy file cabinet mind for future reference or what, but I saw this at Ottendorfer last week and borrowed it (ostensibly for Siu Loong, who has yet to read it). I read it that same night and loved it. I especially loved the author's ending: "Yes. There were children."