"Darby's first-person narrative is frank and immediate . . . expressing what it's like for an ordinary white kid who suddenly discovers evil — and courage — where she lives." — Booklist
Darby Carmichael thinks her best friend is probably the smartest person she knows, even though, as Mama says, Evette’s school uses worn-out books and crumbly chalk. Whenever they can, Darby and Evette shoot off into the woods beyond the farm to play at being fancy ladies and schoolteachers.
One thing Darby has never dreamed of being — not until Evette suggests it — is a newspaper girl who writes down the truth for all to read. In no time, and with more than a little assistance from Evette, Darby and her column in the Bennettsville Times are famous in town and beyond. But is Marlboro County, South Carolina, circa 1926, ready for the truth its youngest reporter has to tell?
Creators
Jonathon Scott Fuqua is the author of many acclaimed books for young readers, including Darby, a Book Sense 76 Top Ten Pick and an International Reading Association Notable Children's Book. His debut novel, The Reappearance of Sam Webber, won an American Library Association Alex Award and was a School Library Journal Best Book of the Year. The Boston Globe described Jonathon Scott Fuqua's most recent novel, The Willoughby Spit Wonder, as "the kind of novel . . . that comes along only once in a blue moon."
