Fame and Glory in Freedom, Georgia by Barbara O’Connor

Frances Foster Books imprint of Farrar Straus Giroux, 2003. 102 pages

Reviewed by Tim Bogar

Synopsis

Bird (Burdette) Weaver is a sixth-grade outcast in a little town in Georgia. A new kid, Harlem, arrives and is instantly disliked. So Bird has the brilliant plan to make him her friend. As she says, "Nobody else wants to be his friend, see, so that means he's available for me," I said. "I think it was a stroke of luck, don't you? Him coming to Freedom and not having any friends and all?"

The problem is, Harlem doesn’t want her for a friend. When she discovers he’s an excellent speller, she aims to make him her partner in a spelling bee. (Oh no, you say, not another spelling bee story. Relax, this one works nicely.)

Bird is lucky at this point in her life to have a kindly neighbor who has moved back to take care of her ailing father. Without Miss Delphine Reese, Bird would have given up trying. O’Connor is big on mentors.

What I liked most

I loved this little book. It’s more affecting in 102 pages than many much longer books, at least for me. I uncharacteristically read it three times, more or less (some skimming the second and third times, going to my favorite parts).

1.) It’s a great lesson in voice. Bird’s voice is distinctive and engaging. She’s one of my favorite first-person narrators ever. O’Connor nails it again.

2.) The engaging, charming protagonist. I was really rooting for her to succeed, because I liked her. A big reason I liked her was because she liked and admired Miss Delphine Reese. There’s a lesson there for writers wanting to create likeable characters. Show them admiring and respecting someone else.

3.) Another good lesson in stakes. What she wants is not very much: a friend, and a day – or even a few minutes – of fame and glory, “to make those pea-flicking kids stop and take a look at Burdette Weaver and really see me instead of looking right through me like I’m Casper the Ghost.” But the stakes are important to her! And because I cared about her, they were important to me.

4.) Good character development. Not a false note in the batch.

Some of my favorite lines:
... “I took one look at him and I said to myself, ‘Bird, here's your chance. Make friends with that kid,’ I said, ‘before somebody poisons his mind with lies about you.’” You gotta root for someone like that.
P. 8: “When I walked into the cafeteria, Janice Carpenter said real loud, “Red and yellow don’t go together, Bird.’

“I looked down at my red sweater and my yellow shirt and I knew she was right. They looked ugly together. Shoot, I thought. They had looked good this morning when I put them on, but now they didn’t.”
I love those last two lines. Shoot! There's a lot of repressed pain in there, though I dunno if kids would pick up on it.

I liked the charming cover. It already puts you in the mood to like the protagonist. That’s another lesson for authors, if they have any say about the cover. Compare with O’Connor’s Me and Rupert Goody or Beethoven in Paradise. Not attractive covers at all.

For you plotties, the plot is simple and its resolution simple – but that’s all right. This is not a book you read for plot, it’s a book you read for character and voice.