It's the 1950's in the American South. Tricia Ann is on top of the world. Her Grandmother is finally ready to allow her to go Someplace Special all by herself, even though it means taking a bus and walking quite a bit further after that. Nashville is segregated, and under Jim Crow laws, Tricia Ann isn't allowed to go everywhere white people can. She can only sit at the back of the bus. She can't sit on just any park bench when she's tired, nor can she drink from any water fountain when she's thirsty. When an enthusiastic crowd mistakenly sweeps her inside an elegant hotel lobby, she is rudely told she isn't welcome there. As she passes a movie theater, she realizes that if she did want to go in, she'd have to enter through the back door and sit in the 'buzzard's roost.' Patricia Ann now realizes how hard it is to go Someplace Special by herself, she just doesn't know if she can make it alone. Then she hears her Grandmother's voice telling her 'Getting Someplace Special is not an easy route. But don't study on quittin', just keep walking straight ahead ' and you'll make it'. Yes, she does get to Someplace Special - where all are welcome. Where is Someplace Special? You'll have to read 'Goin' Someplace Special' to find out. This story is based on true events from Patricia McKissacks' childhood.

Reviewed by: sc

Date read: 7/6/2009

ISBN-10: 0689818858

ISBN-13: 9780689818851

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Every time Loren finally learns to like a place, her parents move her. She's excited to live in Florida, where she has a best friend and plans to join the swimming team this year. Until her parents drop the news: they're moving again. Loren has to stay with her grandmother near Chicago while her parents go to Europe. Will Loren ever get to stay in one place long enough to make it her home?

Reviewed by: emc

Date read: 10/22/2009

ISBN-10: 0670848158

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After ten-year-old Hattie, and her twelve-year-old brother, Pheme's mother dies, they are sent to live with their cold-hearted Cousin Tirzah, while their father hunts gold in the mountains of Colorado in 1882. While waiting for their father to return, the two befriend a nearby woodsman, who gives them a sense of family that they desperately need.

Reviewed by: sc

Date read: 4/13/2009

ISBN-10: 0802783716

ISBN-13: 9780802783714

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Tom Golden is a normal boy. About the only thing the least bit unusual about him is that he is new in his school and that he is picked on by bullies and just about everybody else. In the depths of his misery, he sits crying quietly on his bed. At the same in another part of town, Grey Arthur sits in misery on a park bench. He has been a ghost for years, but he just can't seem to find where he fits in. He has trained as a sorrow summoner, a screamer, a poltergeist and even a faintly real, but has been a miserable failure at all of them. Both boy and ghost cry out at the same time, 'Life isn't fair.' With that, Grey Arthur and Tom Golden become connected. Arthur becomes Tom's invisible friend. A friend Tom doesn't even know he has until an accident somehow enables Tom to see Arthur and all the ghosts in the ghost world. When a ruthless con man finds out that Tom can talk to ghosts, Arthur must protect him from more than gum in his hair and notes on his back.

Reviewed by: caroll

Date read: 11/11/2011

ISBN-10: 0689874731

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Tom Golden and his ghostly invisible friend are back with their ghost friends for another adventure. Although Tom is still the victim of bullies at school, life is starting to become bearable thanks to his ghost friends. Then disaster strikes. A ghost appears on the scene that can be seen by ordinary humans. Once a human sees and believes in this ghost, he can see all ghosts and then they can lead others to see ghosts as well. If the whole human world becomes aware of the ghost world it could mean all out war between the two realms. Can the Invisible Friends find this ghost before it is too late? Read A Good Day for Haunting to find out. This is the third adventure for Golden and Grey.

Reviewed by: caroll

Date read: 11/19/2011

ISBN-13: 9781416908630

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