Saving Savannah
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- $17.99
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- $17.99
Publisher Description
From acclaimed author Tonya Bolden comes the story of a teen girl becoming a woman on her own terms against the backdrop of widespread social change in the early 1900s.
Savannah Riddle is lucky. As a daughter of an upper class African American family in Washington D.C., she attends one of the most rigorous public schools in the nation--black or white--and has her pick among the young men in her set. But lately the structure of her society--the fancy parties, the Sunday teas, the pretentious men, and shallow young women--has started to suffocate her.
Then Savannah meets Lloyd, a young West Indian man from the working class who opens Savannah's eyes to how the other half lives. Inspired to fight for change, Savannah starts attending suffragist lectures and socialist meetings, finding herself drawn more and more to Lloyd's world.
Set against the backdrop of the press for women's rights, the Red Summer, and anarchist bombings, Saving Savannah is the story of a girl and the risks she must take to be the change in a world on the brink of dramatic transformation.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Following Inventing Victoria, Bolden returns to the world of upper-class African-American society in historical Washington, D.C., where she explores the tumultuous changes of 1919 the fight for women's suffrage, the New Negro movement, the growth of anarchism through the eyes of 17-year-old Savannah Riddle, who has grown increasingly embarrassed, even repulsed, by her privileged life. Missing her brother, who has defied their parents' expectations by becoming a photographer in Harlem, and irritated by her best friend's frivolity, Savannah determines to "widen her world." She befriends the cleaning woman's daughter, Nella, and Nella's cousin Lloyd, a socialist-leaning activist, and begins to volunteer at the all-black National Training School for Women and Girls. Her world does widen, and her perspective radicalizes, as she experiences how other people live, even as anarchist actions escalate, bringing danger to her community. While Savannah's characterization lacks some nuance, the story is richly complex in its historical detail, and it builds to a revelatory climax. Enhanced by a comprehensive author's note, this is a valuable portrayal of affluent African-American society and of post-WWI life. Ages 13 up. Correction: A previous version of this review misstated the protagonist's name in one place.
