Walter, Jon. My Name Is Not Friday. 384p. ebook available. Scholastic/David Fickling Bks. Jan. 2016. Tr $18.99. ISBN 9780545855228; ebk. $18.99. ISBN 9780545863711.

Gr 7-10 –The opening line: “I know that I’m with God,” sets the tone for this Civil War novel. Readers first meet 13-year-old Samuel, slung across a mule with a bag tied over his head. Sold into slavery by the priest who housed and educated orphaned “colored boys,” Samuel was punished for something he didn’t do, foreshadowing the further injustices to come. The first-person narrative fleshes out the character of Friday (his slave name), while the compelling style keeps readers turning pages. Sustained by his faith, Samuel helps the other slaves on his plantation by teaching them to read and is eventually reunited with his younger brother in freedom. Descriptive language adds excitement and uncertainty to Samuel’s journey. He recounts his escape from slavery by floating down a river: “I don’t know where we’re going but neither does the river. When the branch of a tree passes, I take hold, and it carries me along like we’re old friends. I expect it’s dead too. We drift downstream together, each of us in the other’s arms, two bits of deadwood cut from a tree the Lord don’t want, being drawn toward the war like water to a plughole.” An author’s note references historical documents, including Harriet Jacobs’s classic Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. VERDICT Pair this lyrically written historical novel with the informational text Stolen into Slavery: The True Story of Solomon Northup, Free Black Man by Judith Fradin (National Geographic, 2013) or Northup’s own Twelve Years a Slave.–Toby Rajput, National Louis University, Skokie, IL