Genre:

I chose P.S. Be Eleven by Rita Williams-Garcia for the Coretta Scott King Award winner category. It won the award in 2014.

Target Age Group:

The target age group is 9-12 years.

Summary:

    P.S. Be Eleven is an enchanting and at times, turbulent contemporary realistic novel for middle schoolers. This novel focuses on a few months in a young Black girl's life in Brooklyn during the 1960s. Friendships and family relationships go through dramatic changes when Delphine, the main protagonist of the novel, and her two younger sisters, Vonetta and Fern, arrive back in Brooklyn. They had spent the summer with their free-spirited and activist mother in Oakland, California. The societal issues of the time such as the Vietnam War, the civil rights movement, the Black Panthers, and the sexual revolution swirl around Delphine's life and bring challenges that energize her to discover the kind of person she hopes to become. Delphine realizes, through pivotal events that take place in the story, that she could still be a strong, loving, and guiding force in the Gaither family without having to undermine the actions and feelings of her two beloved sisters.

Justification:

    My curiosity was piqued when I saw the artwork on the cover of P.S. Be Eleven. The colorful and gorgeous cover of the three young girls wearing bell bottoms and jumping rope brought me back in time to when I was a young girl growing up in the sixties. I was also intrigued by the title. After reading one or two reviews, I learned that the p.s. in the title stood for postscript. For some reason, I thought it was referring to the public school system in New York City. I was elated to discover this novel had an epistolary element to it. This middle-grade novel has won several prestigious awards and I knew by the reviews and the awards I was guaranteed an uplifting experience when I delved into this book.

  Evaluation:

    For this review I will be evaluating setting, pacing, and theme. The setting in P.S. Be Eleven takes place in the well-worn Bed-Stuy neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York during the latter part of the 1960s. Social and political strife were at hand as Delphine Gaither tries to discern how she will be able to continue to  live in the strict but joyful household with Big Ma (Delphine's grandmother) after experiencing a taste of freedom while she was with her mother. The house is a humble home in a diverse community. It was built by her father and it possesses  just enough space for Delphine's younger sisters,Vonetta and Fern, Big Ma, Pa, and eventually, her Uncle Darnell. The safety and comfort of her home are uprooted for a time when her Uncle Darnell comes home from the war but once he leaves, the home that has served as a sanctuary from the turbulence going on in the world becomes a joyful place once more with the addition of Pa's bride, a Miss Marva Hendrix.

    P.S.Be Eleven captures the attention of the reader from the first page of the book. The pacing of this exuberant and sensitive book is written in short chapters. This adds to the excitement of the young reader

in anticipating possible future outcomes for Delphine in her relationships with her family and with her friends at school. The days and months pass by quickly and the reader will be anxious to discover whether Delphine will find her own sense of freedom and just be eleven.

    A theme in this fantastic middle-grade novel was the growth of self-awareness in Delphine from the beginning of the book to how she felt by the conclusion of the story. Delphine knew she was smart, opinionated and likable but as an eleven-year-old girl, she felt awkward, too tall for her age, and unsure if she was guiding her younger sisters in a manner that was helpful or was her help a hindrance to their own personal growth. When Vonetta, the middle sister, was determined to be responsible for the money that was to be used for the Jackson 5 concert tickets, Delphine had a difficult time allowing Vonetta to take control and Delphine viewed herself as the "oppressor." It was at this point in the story that Delphine began to realize she should listen to what her mother had written her, "P.S. For now you are eleven. Be eleven."

Citation:

Williams-Garcia, R. (2013). P.S. be eleven. Amistad Books.