The Watsons Go to Birmingham—1963, by Christopher Paul Curtis

Author Christopher Paul Curtis has an inimitable way of combining laugh-out-loud humor with deep and abiding human themes. His first novel, The Watsons Go to Birmingham—1963, is highly engaging and extraordinarily moving. The Watson family of Flint, Michigan, heads south to their tiny-but-tough grandmother’s home in Birmingham, Alabama, to deliver Kenny’s older brother Byron for the summer, to learn some lessons that his parents hope will keep him from becoming an “official juvenile delinquent.” Their adventures hold more than they can begin to imagine. Nine-year-old Kenny narrates his family’s trip; his voice is full of affection for his momma and dad, little sister Joetta and Byron—and the fresh anticipation of visiting his mother’s growing-up place. Looking back, we now know that the summer of 1963 was a pivotal moment in the civil rights history of our country. Readers might perceive that an ulterior motive of Kenny’s parents in taking the trip is to introduce their children to the strains of racism still imbedded in the south, but the deaths of four young girls in a fire at Sixteenth Street Baptist Church is a horrid shock. Kenny’s relationship to the blaze and its aftermath are gently told; understandably, it has a permanent impact on him and on his family. Curtis’s fictional telling of this historical event, for which he received a Newbery Honor award, is as graceful as it could possibly be, and a fine introduction to a difficult topic. Ages 9 -12.