“Crow,” by Barbara Wright (Random House)
Denver author Barbara Wright sets her story in post-war Wilmington, N.C., 1898, as seen by young Moses, grandson of a former slave.
In Wilmington that year, blacks outnumbered whites, with a growing black middle class and a biracial Republican party that helped elect a biracial city government. Even so, Wilmington’s black families had one eye on the covenant implicit in the 35-year-old Emancipation Proclamation, and the other trained mistrustfully on the resentful white community.
“Crow” is narrated by 11-year-old Moses, whose mother and grandmother both are former slaves far more suspicious of local whites than his well-spoken father, who works for the local black newspaper.
Schooled by his father in the art of diplomacy and self-sufficiency, Moses finds himself taken aback as racial tension grows. Moses witnesses speeches by white supremacist Alfred Moore Waddell, who organized what effectively was a bloody coup d’etat of the municipal government.
Through Moses, Wright focuses this relatively obscure and horrific chapter of American history. Her attention to detail and voice is so spot-on that a publishing representative suggested submitting “Crow” for the prestigious Coretta Scott King award, never guessing that Wright is a white woman. Ages 8 and up.
“The Survivors,” by Will Weaver (HarperTeen)
Taut as a piano wire, this sequel to “Memory Boy” continues the epic of adolescents Miles and Sarah and their parents in the grim world transformed by an apocalyptic volcanic eruption.
This time, Weaver tells the story alternately through Miles and Sarah, whose reflexive sibling mistrust wanes as they learn to cooperate. Fans of Gary Paulsen’s “Hatchet” will recognize the Darwinian pragmatism driving “The Survivors.” Nobody in this world can afford to feel sorry for Bambi’s mom. Ages 12 and up.
“If Only,” by Carole Geithner (Scholastic)
This eloquent and poignant novel begins in the aftermath of a death. Thirteen-year-old Corinna is stumbling, trying to find her way after her mother dies of cancer. Her father, equally stunned, isn’t much help. Neither are the friends who don’t know what to say.
Succor comes from another student whose father recently died, and then from a grief support group established by a thoughtful school staffer. Mistrustful at first, Corinna is astonished to find other kids sharing the same painful journey, reeling after a suicide, a car accident, a bomb in Afghanistan.
Geithner’s story is sentimental in the best sense of that word, exploring the full-heartedness of mourning and the soggy business of going on with life. Nearly everyone who’s struggled with the loss of a loved one will see themselves in this book. Ages 12 and up.
“Rescue in Poverty Gulch,”by Nancy Oswald (Filter Press)
Set in Cripple Creek during the 1896 gold mining boom, this story follows little Ruby, her dad and their mule as they travel from town to town selling candlesticks.
Ruby likes the itinerant life, but when a thief steals their inventory, her father sets up housekeeping in town. That means school with a strict teacher, nosy questions from new friends, and more trouble from the thief. Ages 10 and up.
“The Lions of Little Rock,”by Kristin Levine (G.P. Putnam)
Levine, celebrated for “The Best Bad Luck I Ever Had,” returns with a taut, dynamic story, set in 1958, about two dramatically different 12-year-old girls. Marlee rarely talks. Liz, the new girl at school, almost never shuts up.
Improbably, they become friends, and Liz coaxes Marlee out of her silence. Then someone finds out that Liz’s “lovely tan” didn’t come from sitting by the pool all summer, and she’s kicked out of school for “passing as white.”
Marlee and Liz try to keep up their friendship even as racial tension widens the gap between whites and blacks. But when white supremacists start employing violence, everything changes. Ages 10 and up.
Claire Martin: 303-954-1477 or cmartin@denverpost.com
