Walking to the Bus Rider Blues

Robinet (Forty Acres and Maybe a Mule) sets this quasi-mystery and historical novel in June 1956 during the Montgomery bus boycott, and 12-year-old Alfa's narration brings its ramifications home and lends the events a sense of immediacy. Alfa lives with his great-grandmother Mama Mayfield, well respected in the town even among many white people, and sister Zinnia in a ramshackle tar-paper house. He composes the ""bus-rider blues"" as he attempts to bolster his courage against three white bullies who steal his pay from the Greendale grocery where he works. He manages to turn the tables on the trio by applying the philosophy of the newly arrived Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., whom he hears at rallies in his church. When a wealthy white woman accuses Alfa's family of stealing from her while cleaning her home, he puts King's teachings to the test. Robinet conveys the tension in Montgomery, not only through the impact of the bus boycott and King's preaching of non-violence on day-to-day interactions among townspeople but through the reverberations of African-American Emmett Till's racially motivated murder the previous summer. A few important threads remain only partially explored, such as the loan shark who holds a connection to both the accusing white family and Alfa and Zinnia's ""phantom mother,"" and some inconsistencies come through in Mr. Greendale's and Zinnia's characters. The novel is at its strongest when filling in historical details of the time, such as the volunteer taxi service for bus boycotters, and may well inspire readers to discover more about this important chapter in civil rights history. Ages 8-12. (May)