Audiobook10 hours
Seeing Red
Written by Kathryn Erskine
Narrated by Michael Bakkensen
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
4/5
()
About this audiobook
Publisher Marketing: National Book Award winner Kathryn Erskine delivers a powerful story of family, friendship, and race relations in the South. Life will never be the same for Red Porter. He's a kid growing up around black car grease, white fence paint, and the backward attitudes of the folks who live in his hometown, Rocky Gap, Virginia. Red's daddy, his idol, has just died, leaving Red and Mama with some hard decisions and a whole lot of doubt. Should they sell the Porter family business, a gas station, repair shop, and convenience store rolled into one, where the slogan -- "Porter's: We Fix it Right!" -- has been shouting the family's pride for as long as anyone can remember? With Daddy gone, everything's different. Through his friendship with Thomas, Beau, and Miss Georgia, Red starts to see there's a lot more than car motors and rusty fenders that need fixing in his world. When Red discovers the injustices that have been happening in Rocky Gap since before he was born, he's faced with unsettling questions about his family's legacy.
Author
Kathryn Erskine
Kathryn Erskine is the author of several acclaimed books for young adults and children, including the National Book Award–winning middle grade novel Mockingbird. She lives in Virginia. Visit her website at www.kathrynerskine.com.
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Reviews for Seeing Red
Rating: 3.769230676923077 out of 5 stars
4/5
26 ratings4 reviews
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Sweet, historical, coming-of-age fiction set in 1972 with a few too many problems going on...racism, child abuse,sudden death of a father, liberal teacher teaching the kids to think, you get the picture.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Discover the past,
understand the present,
change the future.
The thing is, when you get over the flu, everything goes back to normal. When your daddy dies, nothing is ever going to be normal again.
-Chapter 14
The above is not a spoiler. The fist sentence in this book talks about Red's dad dying. Red was really close with his dad. They fixed cars together in their shop. Now that Red's dad is dead, Red's mom is trying to figure out how to survive without him. They are living in rural Virginia in the era of the Vietnam War. African Americans and women still don't have many rights and are still widely discriminated against.
Red's mom is planning to sell the house, shop & store and move them all to Ohio where her family lives. Red is very angry about her trying to sell and move. He wants to stay where he is. Being in the shop where he worked with his dad really keeps him connected. He still talks to his dad when he is in the shop.
So, this is a historical fiction book. Not my favorite genre, but this is one of the Sunshine State 2015-16 grade 6-8 nominees. And I am trying to read all of them. This is a well-written story about a 6th grade boy trying to deal with the loss of his father. He is also trying to find his way in a confusing world filled with hatred and bigotry. He learns a great deal and grows up a lot in this book. It's a good book, just not one of my favorites.
Recommended to:
Grade 6 and up. There is some violence and race issues that may be difficult and confusing for younger readers.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Great book. Slightly marred by the anachronistic reference to calling 911. Still, great story and well written.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5“How are you going to make history?” Red’s elderly black neighbor, Miss Georgia asks him when he says he doesn’t like history. It is 1972 in rural Virginia. Red’s father has died unexpectedly and his mama has to sell the family farm, the farm that’s been in the family for at least four generations. Red finds himself enjoying his young teacher’s approach to making them think. He worries about his friend, Rosie, and her violent father. And he wants to find the Freedom Church that Miss Georgia’s great grandfather had started before he was shot to death. This book has the same intensity that Curtis’ The Watsons Go to Birmingham has. The description of Emmett Till’s murder is graphic, but perfectly in touch with the reality of the times. This book is about kinship. And as Miss Georgia points out that may be more than those to whom you are related. It’s about being a part of history and coming to terms with a murder your great grandfather committed in order to gain property. But most of all its about making history and knowing that you stand up for what is right. Grades 5-9