Synopses & Reviews
"Inside me, in a new place, sore with growth, I felt the solid weight of strength holding me up, pushing me forward to face what was sure to come next."
Nissa Bergen is growing up...and finding that she's growing apart from childhood friends and facing adult decisions. Her hometown is changing too. Northerners have settled in Harper, Louisiana, and have opened a cannery. With the new population, new resources -- like more schools -- are needed. But there's growing racial tension, with threats of violence that may come back to hurt Nissa, who created the town's "separate-but-equal" libraries.
Nissa is faced with a chance to be a hero, and like a true hero, she just wants to do what's right. But doing what's right is never easy. Not even for saints.
About the Author
A. LaFaye (the A is for Alexandria) is the author of two earlier books about Nissa Bergen -- The Year of the Sawdus
t Man and
Nissa's Place -- as well as Edith Shay; Strawberry Hill; and
Dad, in Spirit. She lives in San Bernardino, California. Alexandria writes:
"I've always wondered what I'd do when a heroic moment came. Could I do the right thing? If not in real life, I can through my characters. Like Nissa, I remember the pain of growing away from my childhood friends, but as Lara points out, things can turn around. I'm now good friends with most of the folks I knew as a young child.
These days, I enjoy keeping in touch with my friends, spending time with my family, visiting schools, reading, teaching at California State University, San Bernardino, and Hollins University...oh, yeah -- and writing books!"
Table of Contents
Contents Worry Walking
Lies We'd Like to Believe
Rings and Rumors
The Truth in Pieces
The Gathering Storm
Mirrors and Angles
Friends and Foes
Old-Fashioned and Peculiar
Growing Truths
Doing the Right Thing
Good Sense Gone
Lost and Found
Time and Changes
The Changing of the Guard
Reaching
Strength in Prayer
Staying Safe
The Battle
Sainthood
Friends, Family, & Fire
The Right Thing by Degrees
Ideas That Grow
Building
Trials, Traveling Schoolhouses, and Changes Yet to Come