For Ages
9 to 12

It's about keeping the faith.

Growing up poor in 1953 in the Appalachian Mountains of West Virginia doesn't bother Lydia Hawkins. She treasures her tight-knit family. There's her loving mama, now widowed; her whip-smart younger brother BJ, who has cystic fibrosis; and wise old Gran. But everything falls apart after Gran and BJ die and Mama is jailed unjustly. Suddenly Lydia has lost all those dearest to her.  

Moving to a coal camp to live with her uncle William and aunt Ethel Mae only makes Lydia feel more alone. She is ridiculed at her new school for her outgrown homemade clothes and the way she talks, and for what the kids believe her mama did. And to make matters worse, she discovers that her uncle has been keeping a family secret—about her. If only Lydia, with her resilient spirit and determination, could find a way to clear her mother's name. . . .

An Excerpt fromChild of the Mountains

1

It’s about my problem.

Wednesday, October 28, 1953

My mama’s in jail. It ain’t right. Leastwise, I don’t think so. Them folks that put her there just don’t understand our family. My mama’s the best mama in the whole wide world. Everbody used to say so afore the awful stuff happened. Even Uncle William. And he don’t say much nice about nobody.

I got to get her out. But how? Even when they’s wrong, once grown-ups make up their minds about something, a kid like me don’t stand much of a chance of changing it. Poor Mama. I know she hates being caged up like a rabbit, and it’s all my fault.

I feel like my heart done shattered in tiny pieces, like Gran’s vase that me and BJ broke playing tag one time. And I ain’t got nobody to help me put them pieces back together.

That’s why I stopped by the company store after school yesterday and bought me the biggest spiral notebook they had. Maybe writing everthing down will help me sort it all out.

“Lydia, when you…

Under the Cover