Meredith Kiger, Ph.D. (Children's Literature)
Alice Ann Moxley, age 12, has just moved to Mississippi from Chicago. Alice's father is an FBI agent and the year is 1964, a year of racial strife in the deep South. The civil rights movement is in full swing and three civil rights workers have just been murdered. The story follows Alice's life as she tries to fit into Southern culture. Southern culture at the time meant discrimination against blacks, something Alice was not used to in the North. The story is sprinkled with cultural and social props of the period as the writer tries to give the reader a feel for life in 1964. Alice tries disparately to conform to her new friends' ideas of what is cool, but their treatment of blacks and especially the new black girl who enters their class due to integration causes a moral conflict within Alice. Young readers who have never experienced discrimination will get an honest look at what life was like and sadly, may still be in some places. However, the casual, often flippant, reaction by Alice to actual events of violence seems to be downplayed. Alice seems to take in stride the burning of a cross on her lawn and the murder of the black girl's father. The text does not do justice to these horrific events, even for young readers. Otherwise, it is an interesting look at a clash of cultures within white society. 2004, Farrar Straus Giroux, $17.00. Ages 10 to 13.

CCBC (Cooperative Children’s Book Center Choices, 2005)
As a child, author Mary Ann Rodman moved from Chicago to Jackson, Mississippi. Her father was an FBI agent. The year was 1964. Rodman’s own experiences form the basis of this novel about an 11-year-old white northern girl thrust into the heart of southern unrest when her family moves to Mississippi just as school integration becomes a reality. Alice Ann Moxley is still trying to adjust to the southern culture, climate, and accents when Valerie Taylor becomes the first Black child to attend Alice Ann’s new school. Although Alice Ann would like to be friends with Valerie, she’s under intense social pressure not to be. At the same time, Valerie doesn’t seem very interested in getting to know Alice Ann. Finally the two girls do make a few small strides toward friendship, but when Alice Ann sees a chance to be accepted by the most popular girls in her class, she finds it harder and harder to do what she knows is the right thing. When the popular girls begin to target Valerie with hateful tricks and cruel shunning, Alice silently goes along. Rodman’s honest narrative places the very human Alice in the midst of a struggle that will resonate for any child who has ever condoned injustice with silence. Many details firmly grounded Rodman’s story in the mid-1960s, from the Beatle-crazy girls to the increasingly insidious nature of the violence that permeates the thinking and actions of some of the people Alice Ann meets. While some of the secondary characters are not as well developed as others, this is a thoughtful look at difficult times. The story that is never too heavy, or heavy-handed, despite the challenging issues it explores. CCBC categories: Fiction for Children. 2004, Farrar Straus and Giroux, 219 pages, $17.00. Ages 10-13.

Kirkus (Kirkus Reviews, March 15, 2004 (Vol. 72, No. 6))
Living in Mississippi was like living in a foreign country" to 11-year-old Chicago native Alice Ann Moxley. Her FBI-agent father has just been transferred to Jackson to help protect voter registration, and Alice observes racism in her neighborhood and narrates her journey through the sixth grade at Parnell School, one of five city schools about to integrate. The abuse she takes as a Yankee outsider is nothing compared to the torment classmate Valerie faces as a new "colored" student, and when things get ugly Alice has to decide which is more important-fitting in or doing the right thing. Rodman's debut, rooted in her own experience, effectively portrays the layers of prejudice in a Mississippi town in 1964. Each chapter opens with a headline from the Jackson Daily Journal, offering a parallel narrative of bombings, murder, and arson as locals attack civil-rights workers. Though too purposeful, with Alice sometimes seeming more a reporter than a fleshed-out character, the novel is rich in detail and lively writing. An important addition to the field. (author's note) 2004, Farrar Straus & Giroux, 224p, $17.00. Category: Fiction. Ages 10 up. © 2004 Kirkus Reviews/VNU eMedia, Inc. All rights reserved.

Cortney Milanovich (The ALAN Review, Fall 2004 (Vol. 32, No. 1))
Jackson, Mississippi, in the summer of 1964, seems like another country to new resident and former Chicago denizen Alice Ann Moxley. Alice learns that, among other things, she is a "Yankee girl." Alice finds out that making friends is more difficult than in any other place she's ever lived, especially since her father is an FBI agent assigned to Mississippi to protect the rights of blacks. Alice experiences alienation and fear for herself and her family, all the while keeping a personal journal including the daily headlines. Mary Ann Rodman draws on her own life experiences for this book. She was the 10-year-old daughter of an FBI agent in 1964 who moved to Jackson. Yankee Girl is rich with emotional detail interwoven through actual events and occurrences from the summer of 1964 to the summer of 1965. Rodman opens each chapter with a newspaper headline that might have been seen on the front page of the Jackson paper during that era. This book would be a terrific read for junior high school students when taking them through the complex issues of the 1950s and 1960s, especially for helping explain the complex issue of segregation. Category: Historical Fiction/Civil Rights. YA--Young Adult. 2004, Farrar Straus Giroux, 216 pp., $17.00. Ages young adult.Tempe, AZ

Karen Coats (The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, June 2004 (Vol. 57, No. 10))
Despite her mother's assurances that she will someday be glad she lived in 1964, Alice is not glad to be moving to Mississippi, and she is a bit scared to be going to a school that is in the process of being integrated for the first time. As the daughter of an FBI agent, she knows she should befriend the quiet, determined Valerie, daughter of the famous Reverend Claymore Taylor and the only black girl in Alice's class. As a sixth-grader in a new school, however, all Alice wants is to stop being called Yankee Girl and be accepted as a cheerleader. She finds things almost unmanageably different in Mississippi from the way they were in Chicago. There, black people were called "Negroes" and were considered separate but equal; here, they are called "nigras" (or "niggers" by the white trash, as her friend Jeb informs her) and work for white folk. The use of headlines from the Jackson Daily Journal as chapter headings, the inclusion of real historical people, and the autobiographical note that closely connects Alice to Rodman all lend authority to the text, but the presentation suffers from a distinctly uncomplicated binary between Northern and Southern attitudes toward integration, with Rodman using Alice's musings to caricature both sides. Conversations at home focus almost entirely on the stupidity of Southerners who think that blacks are inferior to whites, while at school the children spend their time torturing Valerie. Alice is believably torn between her desire to be popular and her empathy with Valerie, especially when Valerie's father is killed doing his civil rights work (a fear Alice lives with as well), but there is a strong suggestion that the students who finally do begin to accept their black peers do so only on Alice's lead, as if all these Southern children needed was a Northern light. Nonetheless, Rodman's story, if paired with other perspectives, offers insight into doing the right thing in difficult times. Review Code: Ad -- Additional book of acceptable quality for collections needing more material in the area. (c) Copyright 2004, The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois. 2004, Farrar, 219p, $17.00. Grades 4-8.

Horn Book (The Horn Book Guide, Fall 2004)
Alice, the daughter of an FBI agent, and her family move from Chicago to Jackson, Mississippi, in 1964. Longing to fit in, Alice struggles with her classmates' racism toward the only black girl in their newly integrated class. Based on the author's own childhood, the novel explores the moral choices faced by children and the price of courage. Category: Intermediate Fiction. 2004, Farrar, 219pp, $17.00. Ages 9 to 12. Rating: 3: Recommended, satisfactory in style, content, and/or illustration.

Sedrone Harwell (The Lorgnette - Heart of Texas Reviews (Vol. 17, No. 1))
Eleven-year-old Alice is used to moving; however, when her FBI agent father is transferred to Mississippi in 1964, she is torn between wanting to be a part of the popular crowd and being a friend to one black girl in her class in a newly integrated school. This story is very interesting to read. It integrates race relations, school integration, friendship, and civil rights, as well as history. Fiction. Grades 4 and up. 2004, Farrar Straus Giroux, 219p., $17.00. Ages 9 up.

Jennifer McIntosh (VOYA, April 2005 (Vol. 28, No. 1))
The daughter of an FBI agent, eleven-year-old Alice Ann Moxley is used to moving to different places and making new friends. When she and her family are transferred to Mississippi during the height of the civil rights movement in 1964 so that her father can protect African Americans registering to vote, Alice is dubbed the "Yankee Girl" and has a hard time fitting in with her racially segregated schoolmates. Alice lives in fear of the Ku Klux Klan, something she has in common with the other new student at Parnell School, a black girl named Valerie Taylor. Although Alice and Valerie have a hard time becoming friends, it takes a tragedy to make them both realize that what they have in common with each other is more important than the difference in their skin color. Based on true events from the author's life, this book is a solid middle school read that would satisfy historical fiction fans as well as curriculum requirements. Written in clear language and easy to read, the story progresses quickly and the message is strong. On the surface, it is a classic fish-out-of-water story, and students will respond to Alice's attempts to break the cliques at school and try to make new friends. But the book also has significant messages about the dangers of going along with the crowd and the importance of doing the right thing. VOYA CODES: 4Q 4P M (Better than most, marred only by occasional lapses; Broad general YA appeal; Middle School, defined as grades 6 to 8). 2004, Farrar Straus Giroux, 216p., $17. Ages 11 to 14.