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Title details for Miriam's Secret by Debby Waldman - Available

Miriam's Secret

by Debby Waldman
ebook
2 of 2 copies available
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2 of 2 copies available

In 1930 nine-year-old Miriam travels by train from Brooklyn to her grandparents' farm in upstate New York.

Her grandparents are kind, generous people, but they aren't exactly ideal playmates for a lonely girl. When Miriam is not doing homework in the kitchen with Bubby or helping prepare meals for the migrant workers that Zayde hires to help out on the farm, she plays with the barn kittens born just before she arrived. Those kittens are her only friends, until the day Miriam discovers a young girl hiding in the barn. Cissy and her brother, Joe, who's one of Zayde's farm hands, are on the run from an abusive uncle back in Mississippi. Miriam and Cissy hit it off immediately. But their friendship is tested when Miriam is forced to choose between keeping a promise and doing the right thing.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    October 17, 2017

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Read

      • ISBN: 9781459814271
      • File size: 1290 KB

    • EPUB ebook

      • ISBN: 9781459814271
      • File size: 1290 KB

  • Languages

    • English

  • Levels

    • Lexile® Measure: 700
    • Text Difficulty: 3

  • Reviews

    • Kirkus

      September 15, 2017
      It's a wintry spring in 1930 when an 11-year-old Jewish girl gets a lesson in friendship, the Jewish holidays, and America.Miriam has always lived in Brooklyn, but now Papa and Mama are taking the long ship journey to escort family from the Old Country. For the time being, Miriam lives with her loving grandparents Bubby and Zayde on their farm in upstate New York. Instead of bialys and whitefish for breakfast, Miriam eats eggs she finds herself and warm milk "fresh from the cow." The hired men who hop off the freight train are nice, and Miriam can have one of the barn cat's kittens for her very own. Even her loneliness is abated when she meets the secret stranger hiding in the barn. Cissy, also 11, is the sister of one of the hired men. Joe doesn't want Cissy to be sent to an orphanage, so she rides the rails with him from job to job in secret. Miriam explains the festivals of Purim and Passover to Cissy while learning a holiday lesson from Cissy's friendship. The relationship between a white Jewish girl and a black girl from Mississippi is focused on Miriam's inner life and chance to be a savior. Aside from some religious metaphors, this is not an exploration of interracial or cross-class friendships. A warmhearted holiday tale successfully portrays an underrepresented corner of American Judaism--of African-American history, not so much. (author's note) (Historical fiction. 9-11)

      COPYRIGHT(2017) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Formats

  • OverDrive Read
  • EPUB ebook

subjects

Languages

  • English

Levels

  • Lexile® Measure:700
  • Text Difficulty:3

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