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One crazy summer

by Williams-Garcia, Rita.

Format: Book on MP3 Disc 2010
Availability: Available at 1 Library 1 of 1 copy

Available (1)
Location Collection Call #
Plum Community Library Juvenile Audio J PL FIC WIL
Location  Plum Community Library
 
Collection  Juvenile Audio
 
Call Number  J PL FIC WIL
 
 

Summary
Eleven-year-old Delphine and her younger sisters Vonetta and Fern travel to Oakland to meet their mother, Cecil, who abandoned their family years earlier. But even when Cecil gets them to her house, she shows no interest and seems to view them as nothing but a nuisance. Cecil's cold, unloving attitude leaves the girls wishing for the mother-daughter connection they've never had. But Cecil acts remarkably different after she sees her daughters at the Black Panther rally, where they recite a poem Cecil herself had written. At that point, Cecil's attitude toward her daughters begins a remarkable change.
Published Reviews
Booklist Review: "*Starred Review* Eleven-year-old Delphine has only a few fragmented memories of her mother, Cecile, a poet who wrote verses on walls and cereal boxes, played smoky jazz records, and abandoned the family in Brooklyn after giving birth to her third daughter. In the summer of 1968, Delphine's father decides that seeing Cecile is something whose time had come, and Delphine boards a plane with her sisters to Cecile's home in Oakland. What they find there is far from their California dreams of Disneyland and movie stars. No one told y'all to come out here, Cecile says. No one wants you out here making a mess, stopping my work. Like the rest of her life, Cecile's work is a mystery conducted behind the doors of the kitchen that she forbids her daughters to enter. For meals, Cecile sends the girls to a Chinese restaurant or to the local, Black Panther-run community center, where Cecile is known as Sister Inzilla and where the girls begin to attend youth programs. Regimented, responsible, strong-willed Delphine narrates in an unforgettable voice, but each of the sisters emerges as a distinct, memorable character, whose hard-won, tenuous connections with their mother build to an aching, triumphant conclusion. Set during a pivotal moment in African American history, this vibrant novel shows the subtle ways that political movements affect personal lives; but just as memorable is the finely drawn, universal story of children reclaiming a reluctant parent's love.--Engberg, Gillian Copyright 2010 Booklist"
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Publisher's Weekly Review: "Williams-Garcia (Jumped) evokes the close-knit bond between three sisters, and the fervor and tumultuousness of the late 1960s, in this period novel featuring an outspoken 11-year-old from Brooklyn, N.Y. Through lively first-person narrative, readers meet Delphine, whose father sends her and her two younger sisters to Oakland, Calif., to visit their estranged mother, Cecile. When Cecile picks them up at the airport, she is as unconventional as Delphine remembers ("There was something uncommon about Cecile. Eyes glommed onto her. Tall, dark brown woman in man's pants whose face was half hidden by a scarf, hat, and big dark shades. She was like a colored movie star"). Instead of taking her children to Disneyland as they had hoped, Cecile shoos them off to the neighborhood People's Center, run by members of the Black Panthers. Delphine doesn't buy into all of the group's ideas, but she does come to understand her mother a little better over the summer. Delphine's growing awareness of injustice on a personal and universal level is smoothly woven into the story in poetic language that will stimulate and move readers. Ages 9-12. (Jan.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved"
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Additional Information
Subjects Black Panther Party -- Fiction.
Black Panther Party -- Juvenile fiction.
Sisters -- Fiction.
Mothers -- Fiction.
Poets -- Fiction.
African Americans -- Fiction.
Civil rights movements -- Fiction.
Sisters -- Juvenile fiction.
Mothers -- Juvenile fiction.
Poets -- Juvenile fiction.
African Americans -- Juvenile fiction.
Civil rights movements -- Juvenile fiction.
Oakland (Calif.) -- History -- 20th century -- Fiction.
Oakland (Calif.) -- History -- 20th century -- Juvenile fiction.
Children's audiobooks.
Publisher [Solon, Ohio] : Prince Frederick, MD :Playaway Digital Audio ;2010
[Distributed exclusively by] Recorded Books, LLC :
[Manufactured by] Findaway World, LLC,
Edition Unabridged.
Contributors Johnson, Sisi Aisha, narrator.
Recorded Books, LLC.
Playaway Digital Audio.
Findaway World, LLC.
Participants/Performers Narrated by Sisi Aisha Johnson.
Audience Ages 9-12.
Language English
Notes Previously issued on CD by Recorded Books, p2010.
In container (21 x 13 x 3 cm.).
One set of earphones and one AAA battery required for playback.
Accompanying material may vary.
System Details Issued on Playaway, a dedicated audio media player.
Description 1 audio media player (5.25 hr.) : digital ; 3 3/8 x 2 1/8 in.
ISBN 9781449822026
1449822029
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