Product Description
FOR USE IN SCHOOLS AND LIBRARIES ONLY. After the attacks on Pearl Harbor, first-grader Tomie fears the uncertain times in which he lives, all the air raid drills, and the need to put darkening curtains on their windows at night, but with reassurance from his parents, Tomie finds a way to deal with his emotions and cope with living during a time of war. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

A Great Book for Wide Age Range
This is biographical look at Tomie dePaola's growing up years in Meriden, Connecticut. This book opens right after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Tomie, a 2nd grader, is scared. He hears the grownups talking, he hears the President's address on the radio, and he practices air raid drills at school. Everyone tells him that everything is alright, but he's still scared.

This book reads like fiction, but is based on Tomie's real-life experiences, and includes such real details of the war that children wouldn't otherwise know, like nylon hosery being unavailable because nylon was used for parachutes and blackout curtains being used to protect the house. It eerily parallels what today's children have had to deal with, both with the bombing of the World Trade Center five years ago, as well as children dealing today with fathers, brothers and uncles going off to serve in the war in Iraq.

I recommend this book as a read-aloud for Kindergarten up and it's a great read-alone book for kids a little older, all the way up to age 10 or so (and not so bad for the parents either).

I'm Still Scared
This is a great book for young children to read!It covers the news of Pearl Harbor thru New Year's Eve of that year.I believe that Tomie was in the second grade at the time.Mr. dePaola does an excellent job of describing the fears and feelings that a child had at that time.He did a great job of explaining the experience (like bomb shelter preparation) without creating fear in the young reader.My 6 and 4 year old children loved it.We can't wait for the next edition.[...] ... Read more

Product Description
When nineteen-year-old Harriett Gold, from a prominent white family in Cornwall, Connecticut, announced in 1825 her intention to marry a Cherokee man, her shocked family initiated a spirited correspondence debating her decision to marry an Indian. Eventually, Gold's family members reconciled themselves to her wishes, and she married Elias Boudinot in 1826. After the marriage, she returned with Boudinot to the Cherokee Nation, where he went on to become a controversial political figure who was editor of the first Native American newspaper.

Providing rare firsthand documentation of race relations in the early nineteenth-century United States, this volume collects the Gold family correspondence during the engagement period as well as letters the young couple sent to the family describing their experiences in New Echota (capital of the Cherokee Nation) during the years prior to the Cherokee Removal. In an introduction providing historical and social contexts, Theresa Strouth Gaul offers a literary reading of the correspondence, highlighting the value of the epistolary form and the gender and racial dynamics of the exchange. As Gaul demonstrates, the correspondence provides a factual accompaniment to the many fictionalized accounts of contacts between Native Americans and Euroamericans and supports an increasing recognition that letters form an important category of literature. ... Read more