Suggested Reading
Title: Her stories: African American Folk Tales, Fairy Tales, and True Tales written by Virginia Hamilton, illustrated by Leo and Diane Dillon, 1995
Description: Collection of 19 folktales, legends, and true stories celebrating the heroic cunning, patience, and courage of African-American women and girls.
Award: A Coretta Scott King Honor Book
Ages: 9-12
Review: A volume with as broad appeal as Hamilton's The People Could Fly (1985). All the stories collected feature females, but there similarities end; a variety of ordinary girls and women, her-vampires, mermaids, and witches inhabit humorous and frightening folktales, accounts of life in slavery taken from oral history collections, and elaborate fairy tales incorporating elements from many traditions into solid, African-American renderings. Hamilton divides the collection into "Her Animal Tales," "Her Fairy Tales," Her Supernatural," "Her Folkways and Legends," and "Her True Tales." Comments follow each story, offering insights and assurances of authenticity; source notes appear in the back. The Dillons bring luster to an already wonderful project, with polished acrylic portraits on creamy backgrounds; the pictures envelop the mythic aspects of the tales without abandoning their roots in ordinary human experience. It's hard to envision the shelf--children's or adults'--on which this volume doesn't belong. (Kirkus Reviews, October 15, 1995)
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Description: Collection of 19 folktales, legends, and true stories celebrating the heroic cunning, patience, and courage of African-American women and girls.
Award: A Coretta Scott King Honor Book
Ages: 9-12
Review: A volume with as broad appeal as Hamilton's The People Could Fly (1985). All the stories collected feature females, but there similarities end; a variety of ordinary girls and women, her-vampires, mermaids, and witches inhabit humorous and frightening folktales, accounts of life in slavery taken from oral history collections, and elaborate fairy tales incorporating elements from many traditions into solid, African-American renderings. Hamilton divides the collection into "Her Animal Tales," "Her Fairy Tales," Her Supernatural," "Her Folkways and Legends," and "Her True Tales." Comments follow each story, offering insights and assurances of authenticity; source notes appear in the back. The Dillons bring luster to an already wonderful project, with polished acrylic portraits on creamy backgrounds; the pictures envelop the mythic aspects of the tales without abandoning their roots in ordinary human experience. It's hard to envision the shelf--children's or adults'--on which this volume doesn't belong. (Kirkus Reviews, October 15, 1995)
*information from NoveList Plus
Title: Big River's Daughter written by Bobbi Miller, 2013
Description: When River Fillian's powerful father, a pirate on a Mississippi keeler, disappears after a horrific earthquake in 1811, she must challenge the infamous rivals who hope to claim his territory and find her own place in the new order. Includes historical notes.
Ages: 9-12
Review: Never heard of Annie Christmas or Mike Fink? Miller calls upon her storytelling voice to weave anecdotes from folklore about these two larger-than-life characters into a novel, casting a river pirate's daughter at the helm of this eddy of an adventure. When the great earthquake of 1811 causes the Mississippi to run backward, River Fillian's father is killed in a fire, leaving her alone with just his carved spyglass. Annie Christmas takes her under her wing, along with her nine sons (all with "C" names: Cully, Cam, Coby, etc.), and together they set off to find Blackbeard's treasure, buried by Jean Lafitte. They pick up historical and legendary figures along the way, including Mike Fink, and River rescues a young tiger, which becomes her protective sidekick. A passel of scoundrels pursues them through the swamps and bayous around New Orleans. This strong-girl-heroine tale is abundant in descriptions of river life, but the colloquial language tends to impede the narrative flow, and although it's an adventure, it's almost too packed with action for the pages to contain it. The cover depicts River and her tiger in a lighthearted moment, suggesting a "prettified story," which River assures readers it's not. "There you are and there you ain't.…[T]hat's life on the raggedy edge." A breakneck tale that never quite catches its breath. (Kirkus Reviews, March 15, 2013)
*information from NoveList Plus
Description: When River Fillian's powerful father, a pirate on a Mississippi keeler, disappears after a horrific earthquake in 1811, she must challenge the infamous rivals who hope to claim his territory and find her own place in the new order. Includes historical notes.
Ages: 9-12
Review: Never heard of Annie Christmas or Mike Fink? Miller calls upon her storytelling voice to weave anecdotes from folklore about these two larger-than-life characters into a novel, casting a river pirate's daughter at the helm of this eddy of an adventure. When the great earthquake of 1811 causes the Mississippi to run backward, River Fillian's father is killed in a fire, leaving her alone with just his carved spyglass. Annie Christmas takes her under her wing, along with her nine sons (all with "C" names: Cully, Cam, Coby, etc.), and together they set off to find Blackbeard's treasure, buried by Jean Lafitte. They pick up historical and legendary figures along the way, including Mike Fink, and River rescues a young tiger, which becomes her protective sidekick. A passel of scoundrels pursues them through the swamps and bayous around New Orleans. This strong-girl-heroine tale is abundant in descriptions of river life, but the colloquial language tends to impede the narrative flow, and although it's an adventure, it's almost too packed with action for the pages to contain it. The cover depicts River and her tiger in a lighthearted moment, suggesting a "prettified story," which River assures readers it's not. "There you are and there you ain't.…[T]hat's life on the raggedy edge." A breakneck tale that never quite catches its breath. (Kirkus Reviews, March 15, 2013)
*information from NoveList Plus