sydneyraereads's review
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
This was an excellent family story about reckoning with your past to get more out of your present and future. The character work was stellar and the setting was vibrant.
parchmints's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.5
summer_reader_vne's review
4.0
This book reminded me of why I started reading. Fun and Engaging school-like reads, light and fluffy, as I like them.
i_will_papercut_a_bish's review
5.0
Just South of Home is written in a vivid, authentic southern voice that weaves together the spooky unsettled business of the rural Georgia town of Warrenville with the changing relationships of 12-year-old fact-loving Sarah. Dark history meets unflinching honesty, compassion, and community as Sarah and her young family members look for answers.
Not only does Karen Strong's voice shine as she writes about the difficulties, warmth, and humor of family bonds (I giggled and cried), but I also found myself shivering and peeking out my blinds at night, checking for creepy spirits. This book is a must-have for summer reading lists (or any other time of year, for that matter!!).
If I could give it six stars, I would.
Not only does Karen Strong's voice shine as she writes about the difficulties, warmth, and humor of family bonds (I giggled and cried), but I also found myself shivering and peeking out my blinds at night, checking for creepy spirits. This book is a must-have for summer reading lists (or any other time of year, for that matter!!).
If I could give it six stars, I would.
snazel's review
5.0
Quiet, gentle story about belonging, family, and old traumas. Very internal— very soft, for something about the scars left by lynching. A great introduction to the history (for those who wouldn't know), and about healing (for those who would know). The ending kinda wraps everything up very fast, but still an excellent Middle Grade.
(And the transition from enemies-cousins to ride-or-die family who have each other's backs was SO satisfying.)
(And the transition from enemies-cousins to ride-or-die family who have each other's backs was SO satisfying.)
rknuttel's review
5.0
THIS IS A PERFECT MIDDLE GRADE BOOK AND I LOVED IT.
It’s got everything you would want in a book - summer, a small town, great family dynamics, spooky bits, mysteries, a crazy climax, some important history hidden in there, a smart and responsible protagonist, a silly little brother, a bearded dragon! I mean, do I need to go on?
But really, one of my favorite parts about this book is that it’s a ghost story, but it gets real about the terrible history of the Klan in the south, and how that history still impacts the community today. Kids need to understand the past, even the bad parts, so that we can all have a better future. Plus, it’s a fantasy with POC main characters who also grace the cover of the book!! More please, Karen Strong!
It’s got everything you would want in a book - summer, a small town, great family dynamics, spooky bits, mysteries, a crazy climax, some important history hidden in there, a smart and responsible protagonist, a silly little brother, a bearded dragon! I mean, do I need to go on?
But really, one of my favorite parts about this book is that it’s a ghost story, but it gets real about the terrible history of the Klan in the south, and how that history still impacts the community today. Kids need to understand the past, even the bad parts, so that we can all have a better future. Plus, it’s a fantasy with POC main characters who also grace the cover of the book!! More please, Karen Strong!
healingtothemax's review
3.0
Weighty subject matter requires group-adult reading and use of the book's provided reading guide. This is not a book to easily handoff without followup - it is a necessary book which leads to more awareness and discussion. Middle-grade target audience served by its initial subject matter - summertime spent navigating fraying friendships and tense family ties - gets thrown a loop by family secrets, ghosts and child murder. No mistake here - that scene, those revelations and the too quick wrap up of dealing with life-changing experiences is ungainly handled and tossed away without the consideration of its impact upon characters, story and readers (young and older). Evil arrives in ghostly and corporeal forms, big and little, young and older, soul-sucking and soul-wounding. I wish author Strong in her debut had more nuanced guidance by her editorial team to make a choice and stick with the lived-in story of a science "nerd" girl navigating family-friend demands, quarrels, hopes and heartaches or gone full-in on solving a dark family secret and healing community wounds in dealing with one ghost child and how the truth, be it difficult to face and hard to unearth, can truly set more than one soul free.
yapha's review
4.0
An important history lesson disguised as a ghost story. Don't read this one late at night! Recommended for grades 4 & up.
the_fabric_of_words's review
5.0
This is a ghost story, a bit spooky for October, but dead serious in confronting racism. Pay attention to the tree on the front cover, as it's the setting for the ghost soul's and community's agony and pain.
Sarah spends the summer doing chores at her grandmother's house, with her little brother Ellis. She wants to hole up in her room and read instead, but her sophisticated and glamorous cousin, Janie, whose mom is in LA pursuing her acting career, comes to visit and Sarah's tasked with keeping her out of trouble.
Good luck with that! Janie has a knack for sticking her nose into things that are "better left alone," so when the girls, Ellis and Sarah's friend, Jasper, follow Janie into the forest to find an abandoned old church and its graveyard, you know something's going to crawl out of the ground and come after them.
But it's not at all what you imagine.
By the burnt-out husk of an enormous old tree in the cemetery, they find a haint, a ghost of a young, barefoot, bedraggled boy who's waiting for his mom. Janie finds a piece of costume jewelry in the dirt and takes it.
Soon the haints are at Sarah's window, leaving their palm and foot prints all over the side of her house! They want the trinket back, or so Sarah and Janie surmise.
The kids do not know what took place in the branches of that tree, but they will find out. And as they slowly uncover the horror of their town's history, they also uncover a community grieving and still suffering in stifling silence.
This was an excellent read, featuring Black and mixed characters working together to expose the racism and prejudice buried underneath the veneer of modern day, and in the process, promote healing for the haints trapped in the tree, within their own families, and in their community, all by confronting the past head-on.
A powerful read! Enjoy.
Looking for more book suggestions for your 7th/8th grade classroom and students?
Visit my blog, The Fabric of Words, for more great middle grade book recommendations, free teaching materials and fiction writing tips: https://amb.mystrikingly.com/
Sarah spends the summer doing chores at her grandmother's house, with her little brother Ellis. She wants to hole up in her room and read instead, but her sophisticated and glamorous cousin, Janie, whose mom is in LA pursuing her acting career, comes to visit and Sarah's tasked with keeping her out of trouble.
Good luck with that! Janie has a knack for sticking her nose into things that are "better left alone," so when the girls, Ellis and Sarah's friend, Jasper, follow Janie into the forest to find an abandoned old church and its graveyard, you know something's going to crawl out of the ground and come after them.
But it's not at all what you imagine.
By the burnt-out husk of an enormous old tree in the cemetery, they find a haint, a ghost of a young, barefoot, bedraggled boy who's waiting for his mom. Janie finds a piece of costume jewelry in the dirt and takes it.
Soon the haints are at Sarah's window, leaving their palm and foot prints all over the side of her house! They want the trinket back, or so Sarah and Janie surmise.
The kids do not know what took place in the branches of that tree, but they will find out. And as they slowly uncover the horror of their town's history, they also uncover a community grieving and still suffering in stifling silence.
This was an excellent read, featuring Black and mixed characters working together to expose the racism and prejudice buried underneath the veneer of modern day, and in the process, promote healing for the haints trapped in the tree, within their own families, and in their community, all by confronting the past head-on.
A powerful read! Enjoy.
Looking for more book suggestions for your 7th/8th grade classroom and students?
Visit my blog, The Fabric of Words, for more great middle grade book recommendations, free teaching materials and fiction writing tips: https://amb.mystrikingly.com/