M.C. Higgins, the Great

Author: Virginia Hamilton

First line: Mayo Cornelius Higgins raised his arms high to the sky and spread them wide.

Why you should read this book: M.C. Higgins, famed for swimming, pole climbing, and tracking, knows two things for certain: that Sarah's Mountain, his family's land since his great-grandmother escaped there from slavery, is his birthright, where he will live out the rest of his life; and also, that he must move his family far from the path of the huge spoil heap left behind when the machines cut off thirty feet of mountain for ten feel of coal before the dreadful pile of rock and earth cascades down the hillside and crushes them all to death. That summer, two strangers come to Sarah's Mountain, a dude with a tape recorder who could make his mother into a famous singer, and a girl traveling on her own with a hunting knife. This exceptional story shows M.C. learning to use his strength, brains, and heritage to forge his own path into adulthood.

Why you shouldn't read this book: Just not into great literature.