Her novel Bayou Magic is featured in the third season of Apple TV+'s Emmy award-winning series Ghostwriter. Rhodes is also the author of Paradise on Fire (winner of the Green Earth Book Award), Towers Falling and the celebrated Louisiana Girls Trilogy, which includes Ninth Ward, winner of a Coretta Scott King Honor Award, Sugar, and Bayou Magic. She is the author of several books for children including the New York Times bestsellers Black Brother, Black Brother and Ghost Boys, which has garnered over 50 awards and honors including The Walter Award, the Indies Choice/EB White Read-Aloud Award, and the Jane Addams Children’s Book Award for Older Readers. And even though the ghosts play a role in resolving the ultimate conflict, I think Rhodes did an excellent job in making this a real middle grade novel, with the action being propelled forward by the children.Jewell Parker Rhodes (born 1954 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) is an American bestselling novelist and educator. (Which makes me wonder why this one ended up in the “realistic fiction” section of my children’s lit class…) Even so, the ghosts don’t seem out of place it is New Orleans after all. Lanesha has the ability to see those who have passed on, and can even talk to them. The only difference with this one is that it has ghosts.

This one is no exception (I hadn’t read it before!). She knows her audience, knows how to talk to her audience, and knows how to make difficult subjects into a gripping, interesting, compelling story.

I adore Rhodes, and the way she takes tough issues and makes them really accessible to younger readers.

Mama Ya-Ya passes on in the middle of the storm, and Lanesha is left to figure out how to ride out the flooding that came after the hurricane by herself. That is, until a storm - Hurricane Katrina - comes riding in. But, even though they’re poor, Lanesha’s happy. Lanesha lives in New Orleans’ Ninth Ward, one of the poorest sections of the city, with her Mama Ya-Ya, who is the woman who delivered her, because Lanesha’s mother has passed on and her extended family doesn’t want her.

It’s in the middle grade (grades 3-5) section of the bookstore. Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!Ĭontent: There are some intense moments, but it’s written very simply. First sentence: “They say I was born with a caul, a skin netting covering my face like a glove.”

Ninth ward book