  | Full Text Reviews: Booklist - 10/15/2016 It’s 1955 in Mississippi, and 13-year-old Rose has a dream: to leave the cotton fields, follow her mama to Chicago, go to an integrated school, and then head to college to become a teacher or doctor—thereby having the means to take care of her family. But then her harridan of a grandmother decrees that Rose won’t be going back to school, even though she’s only finished seventh grade. So much, it would seem, for her dream. Meanwhile, the larger world intrudes when a young neighbor is murdered for registering to vote and then a 14-year-old boy visiting from Chicago named Emmett Till is also murdered. Will the deaths be meaningless or will they presage change, both for Mississippi and for Rose? Jackson’s debut does an excellent job dramatizing the injustice that was epidemic in the pre–civil rights South and capturing the sounds and sensibilities of that time and place. Her sympathetic characters and their stories will make this thoughtful book especially good for classroom use. - Copyright 2016 Booklist. Loading...
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