Monday's Not Coming

Jackson, Tiffany D..  Monday's Not Coming.  2018.  Katherine Tegen Books, and imprint of HarperCollins.  New York, NY. 


Book Talk:
Monday and Claudia have been best friends since Kindergarten.  Attached at the hip, the two girls revel in every shared moment.  They think of themselves as sisters, and call themselves twins.  They share so many things - but not everything.  Claudia's parents are upwardly mobile, middle class working adults who are doing their best to give their daughter every advantage they can afford.  Monday's mother lives in Public Housing, and does what she can.

Claudia arrives home from her Grandmother's house the day before 8th grade starts, looking forward to the beginning of a great year and high school applications.  Claudia expresses mild anxiety because Monday has not been heard from all summer.
When Monday never shows up for school, nobody except for Claudia notices.  Nobody can answer the question "Where is Monday" and it seems as if nobody cares to find out what happened to Monday.
How can a teenage girl vanish and nobody notice?

Book Awards:
Coretta Scott King John Steptoe Award for New Talent 2019
Walter Dean Myer Honored Book


Author Website:
http://writeinbk.com/


Note from Bettina:
Many, many years ago, I taught in Washington DC.  As a newly minted teacher, I was excited to have my own classroom and a chance to change the world.  I was rudely awakened to the harsh realities of life where every meal, every day, every life - is not a given. I taught in a neighborhood much like Ed Borough.  The neighborhood that fed into our school has been torn down and replaced by new upscale housing.  The elementary school - with bars over the windows, no air conditioning, and an open air drug market across the street - has become a charter school and looks nothing like the building where I worked. 


I saw young kids forced to make choices no 8 year old should ever have to make.  As a teacher, I had some of the most gifted, amazing, bright students it has ever been my privilege to work with.   Some of them have made it to adulthood, and are bright shining stars, making change and living wonderful lives.  Others never made it out alive.  Monday's Not Coming struck so close to home for me.  While this story is fiction, it rhymes with so many real life stories.  It has taken me over a week to be able to sit down and write this review.  And I cried many times while writing it, remembering the young voices and talent that have been silenced forever.

This is an excellent work, Tiffany.  Thank you for giving voice to the voiceless and telling stories that need to be told.  I look forward to reading your stories for years to come.

Image Source: http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1046101307