The Braid by Helen FrostFrost, Helen. The Braid. New York: Frances Foster Books, 2006. 9780374309626. Trade cloth. $19.95.
Annotation:
Two sisters, in 1850, are separated when their family is forced to leave their home in Scotland. The sister's stories alternate with poems that bind together both of their experiences.
Awards:
School Library Journal Best Books, 2006YALSA Best Books for Young Adults, 2007
Texas Tayshas Reading Lists, 2008In the days before airplanes and transatlantic phone cables, when you separated from your family for a journey across the ocean, you knew you might never see or hear from them again. In Scotland, in 1850, sisters Sarah, Jeannie, and the rest of their family are forced out of their home by their landlord. Their father decides they will sail to Canada and start over there. Grandma won’t be going.
Sarah, the oldest, can’t leave Grandma or the land that she feels tied to, but how can she bear to separate from her mother and father, her little brother and sisters, and her dearest sister Jeannie? The night before the journey, Sarah braids her hair with Jeannie’s before they go to bed. Jeannie wakes to find her hair cut and Sarah gone. Sarah left half of the braid on the pillow for Jeannie and took the other half with her.
Their intertwined hair is a token of their sisterhood as they begin their new lives apart from one another, Jeannie to Canada and Sarah to the Scottish island where her grandmother was born. The book alternates between Sarah and Jeannie’s stories. They experience their difficulties and triumphs alone, but like the braid that connects them in spirit, the book connects them through language. There are poems in between the sister’s turns at telling their stories and the imagery of the poems weaves the two girls’ experiences together.
Sarah, the oldest, can’t leave Grandma or the land that she feels tied to, but how can she bear to separate from her mother and father, her little brother and sisters, and her dearest sister Jeannie? The night before the journey, Sarah braids her hair with Jeannie’s before they go to bed. Jeannie wakes to find her hair cut and Sarah gone. Sarah left half of the braid on the pillow for Jeannie and took the other half with her.
Their intertwined hair is a token of their sisterhood as they begin their new lives apart from one another, Jeannie to Canada and Sarah to the Scottish island where her grandmother was born. The book alternates between Sarah and Jeannie’s stories. They experience their difficulties and triumphs alone, but like the braid that connects them in spirit, the book connects them through language. There are poems in between the sister’s turns at telling their stories and the imagery of the poems weaves the two girls’ experiences together.
Sarah is plucky and strong, not afraid to go against convention. Jeannie must take Sarah’s place as the oldest child and develops her own strength and resourcefulness. Apart, but parallel, they grow up, choose paths and create new lives for themselves. Each wondering about the sister she parted from, with nothing to connect them but The Braid.
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joy to read
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