This was a short book, so it was a quick read for me, but its message didn't fall very flat and the subject was still handled maturely and with care.Akilah is a very sweet, bright, and high-spirited girl who is waiting impatiently -- as all children are apt to do-- for the return of her very dear...
Be Eleven Half-moons and Squiggles Mr. Mwila walked down the space that separated the girls and Ellis Carter from the boys, to hand out our second attempt at essay writing. I twisted and craned to catch an Excellent, Very Good, Good, or Satisfactory on someone’s paper. I couldn’t help but be comp...
He had overslept. He had no place to go but up to the roof and free his birds. An hour earlier he would have slipped downstairs and eaten his cereal unnoticed. As it was, he could hear Shakira telling about the comedies and splendor of carnival to Truman in an excited patois. Thulani himself no l...
She meowed and howled and turned in her sleep. “Go sit on the toilet,” I told her. She clung to my side, meowing and howling. Vonetta yelled, “Quit it, Fern. I can’t sleep.” I paid her no mind and neither did Fern. If Fern couldn’t sleep, then we all couldn’t sleep, so too bad for Vonetta and too...
BING, BANG, BOOM. Six triangles on my essay. Black ink dug deep in the margin. Bing, bang, boom. A chain of black triangles. Didn’t know I was doing it. Making them. Linking them. Can’t stop myself. Why stop now? Might as well go to the end. Down to the last line. Seven. Eight. Bing, bang, boom. ...
Once the two astronauts had walked on the moon the excitement seemed to die down for everyone except JimmyTrotter, who listened to updates on his pocket radio and watched Apollo 11 news on our television set when Big Ma’s programs weren’t on. Soon everything would go back to normal. The astronaut...