Eleven-year-old Ella seeks information about her father while enjoying a visit with her mother, a jazz singer, in Boston in 1944, then returns to the harsh realities of segregated, small-town South Carolina. - (Baker & Taylor)

A 12-year-old girl living in Jim Crow South Carolina is bullied for her light skin tone before an invitation to spend Christmas with her jazz-singer mother in Boston reveals her family's unlikely history. A first novel. 25,000 first printing. Simultaneous eBook. - (Baker & Taylor)

To Kill a Mockingbird meets One Crazy Summer in this powerful, bittersweet novel about one girl's journey to reconnect with her mother and learn the truth about her father in the tumultuous times of the Jim Crow South.

"Timely, captivating, and lovely. So glad this book is in the world." —Jacqueline Woodson, author of Brown Girl Dreaming
 

Karyn Parsons is best known for her role as Will Smith's cousin Hilary Banks on NBC's The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. After leaving acting behind, Karyn has gone on to found and produce Sweet Blackberry, an award-winning series of children's animated films, to share stories about unsung Black heroes in history, featuring narration from stars such as Alfre Woodard, Queen Latifah, and Chris Rock. The videos have been screened on HBO and Netflix, and enjoyed by schools and libraries across the country. She is the author of Clouds over California, Flying Free: How Bessie Coleman's Dreams Took Flight,How High the Moon, and Saving the Day. Karyn lives with her family in Providence, Rhode Island.

Booklist Reviews

Ella, 12, lives in Alcolu, South Carolina. It's 1943, so segregation is in full force. But Ella's mother is in Boston, working in the navy yards by day and singing in jazz clubs at night, and when Ella goes to live with her, the girl's eyes are opened to a different sort of life. Though the story is Ella's, her cousins Henry and Myrna, also raised by the trio's grandparents, share the narration. The story is crammed with issues: Ella's search for her white father; the excitement and disappointments of living with her mother; the arrest and execution of Myrna's boyfriend, George, for the murder of two girls; even a hint of a same-sex relationship between Ella's mother and her roommate. The book is at its best when the focus is on Ella. Her lively first-­person narrative holds readers' attention, making Henry and Myrna's appearance at times a distraction. Despite a need for streamlining (and more emotional heft to George's story), this has some wonderful voices and character interactions, and an evocative cover will draw readers. Grades 5-8. Copyright 2019 Booklist Reviews.

Kirkus Reviews

As compelling as Brown Girl Dreaming, as character-driven as One Crazy Summer, and as historically illuminating as Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry. Eleven-year-old Ella Hankerson yearns to know her absent father, but her mother, Lucy, and grandparents constantly evade her questions. Teased by other black kids for her light skin and white-seeming features, Ella indulges in wild speculation—maybe it's Cab Calloway? Lucy has left Ella in Alcolu, South Carolina, for work and a jazz career in Boston, and although Granny and Poppy provide a loving home for Ella and two of her cousins (who share narration duties with Ella), 14-year-old orphan Myrna and Ella's best friend, 12-year-old Henry, the rural South in the 1940s can be dangerous for black folks. Racists charge George Stinney, a quiet, shy boy, with murdering two little white girls, and Myrna once encountered a black family lynched and hanging from the trees. Although Ella eagerly leaves the farm to stay with her mother, s he finds Boston also imperfect, as she must spend hours alone in the tiny apartment while Lucy and her roommate, Helen, work as shipfitters. A riveting read, this novel masterfully presents Southern and Northern conflicts through the perspective of a no-nonsense kid who is trying to find her place in the world. Ella's realistic voice and passionate responses to injustices make her a credible, flawed, and likable character who sees the truth in front of her but often doesn't recognize it. A captivating novel that sheds new light on black childhood. (Historical fiction. 8-12) Copyright Kirkus 2018 Kirkus/BPI Communications. All rights reserved.

PW Annex Reviews

In 1943, 11-year-old Ella Hankerson's African-American mother has moved to the buzzing metropolis of Boston to become a jazz singer—far away from Ella's small town of Alcolu, S.C., where she lives with her grandparents. Ella doesn't know who her father is—just that he headed out west—but she's sometimes teased for her white facial features, and she wonders if he could be Cab Calloway. When Ella's mom sends a telegram asking her to visit for Christmas, Ella plans to show her just how much she's grown up. Life is often dangerous and unjust for Ella and her black family and friends in the Jim Crow South, and Boston poses new challenges. Her mother works all day at the navy yard and sings in jazz clubs at night, leaving Ella in her tiny apartment, and the visit is over all too soon. Chapters alternate between Ella's narration and the stories of cousins Henry and Myrna, who live back home, where an innocent black teen is unjustly accused of two murders. Parsons' debut novel offers a complex exploration of Northern and Southern racial tensions and one girl's bumpy path toward knowing herself. Ages 8–12. (Mar.)