Scattergood, Augusta Glory Be, 199 pgs. Scholastic Press, 2012. $16.99 Content: Language: G; Mature Content: G; Violence: PG.
Glory is the daughter of the local preacher and during the summer of 1964, living in the south brings with it a lot changes. Glory is excited to celebrate her 12th birthday at the local swimming pool and is disappointed by the town council’s decision to close the pool to keep out the blacks. She befriends a new girl whose mother is visiting her small Mississippi town as one of the Freedom workers, and her new friendship disrupts Glory’s old friendship with her best friend Frankie because his father is very prejudice. Glory is also struggling with her sister Jesslyn, because Jessie is growing up and has found herself a boyfriend, so their sisterhood is changing. Throughout the change in this short summer, Glory comes of age and stays true to what she believes and learns more about herself and those in her town.
I’m torn about my review of this book because it had an interesting historical setting, but I didn’t love the main character. I also felt like the historical parts of this book needed to be explained, it was assumed that the reader knew what was going on in Mississippi during this time in the Civil Rights Movement and I don’t think the young audience this book was directed towards would have that kind of knowledge base. To me this book was almost good, it was almost really good, but it was missing the character development that would have made it great.
EL (4-6), MS-OPTIONAL. Reviewer, C. Peterson.
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