This is an outstanding book. I hope schools will quickly add it to required reading lists for middle schoolers. It is a young adult novel but certainly should not be limited to this age group. I'm 37 and loved it. The characters are so real they completely tug at your emotions. The book follows 12 year old Polly as her world, including the segregated south around her, starts to change. Her mother is an outcast from her upper- crust family for taking up with the wrong man. Her outcast status enables her intense love and friendship to develop with a black woman, Henri. By extension, Henri's niece Timbre Ann and Polly grow to be close friends...as close as sisters. Their relationship is challenged as civil injustices begin to plague their communities. Polly is caught in the middle on many levels, the most upsetting is her discovery that her own father may be involved in racist vandalism.

The book's last 100 pages are full of edge of your chair suspense. Bethany Hegedus manages to keep us on the edges of those seats while still developing the characters beautifully. Bethany is a gifted writer and I hope we see more of this character Polly in future books....or just more of Bethany Hegedus period! ( )

This story is not only about the friendship of a young white girl and young black girl growing up in the south in 1959, but it's about family (not just by blood) and deals with the injustice that is racism. As Penny realizes that the friendship with her best friend Timbre Ann may be ending she also has to deal with the issues of her family, which her parents had tried to always hide from her in the past. She also has to come to some harsh social realizations.

This book was so touching. I felt everything Penny was going through. While I'm not naive enough to believe that racism doesn't exist anymore, I'm glad our country has made the progress that it has. I can't even begin to imagine what living in the south as an African American must have been like when this book took place. I think that Bethany Hegedus did a great job with this story, keeping it accurate from a 12-year-old's point of view. This story is touching, heartfelt, compassionate and emotional. ( )