jazmin's notebook

Poetry Review
LS 5603.20/Spring 2010
S. Vardell

BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Grimes, Nikki. jazmin's notebook. New York, New York: Puffin Books , 1998. ISBN 0803722249

PLOT SUMMARY: Jazmin is a young black girl growing up in a tough neighborhood and dealing with an absentee mother. Her only solace is her poetry and recording her thoughts on the stoop of the apartment she and her sister share.

CRITICAL ANALYSIS:
jazmin's notebook is a free verse novel by Nikki Grimes. With a poem introducing each chapter, this novel features a "young afro-american teenager" expressing her opinion through her notebook (Dean Wilder, A.J. Boggs and Company 1999). Readers get an internal view of Jazmin's life and the inspirations for her poetry. A strong fleshed out character, Jazmin has a mind of her own and a will to succeed despite the setbacks of her earlier years. Nikki Grimes gives her young character determination and vision. Rooting for Jazmin becomes a joy and the reader will be actively cheer for the heroin until the end. This verse novel can inspire anyone to work hard and achieve their dream. The reader is left with a clear picture and hope for Jazmin's future.

AWARDS WON AND REVIEW EXCERPTS:
Coretta Scott King Book Award, 1999 Honor Book United States

CCBC (Cooperative Children's Book Center Choices, 1998)
Jazmin is a bright, introspective 14 year old growing up in Harlem in the early 1960s who faces the harsh realities of her world with a poet's heart and soul. Living with her competent older sister who's little more than a teenager herself, Jazmin looks at the world with an endearing mixture of realism and optimism, which she expresses in a poem at the opening of each first-person chapter.

Kirkus (Kirkus Reviews, 1998)
There's a poetic soul taking notes up on Amsterdam Avenue in New York City, and her name is Jazmin Shelby, the star witness to the hard lives and high hopes in a novel from Grimes (Come Sunday, 1996, etc.).

CONNECTIONS:
Link to Coretta Scott King curricular resources at teachingbooks.net http://www.teachingbooks.net/titlesearch.cgi?id=3604&a=1&crc=1

CLCD 's Nikki Grimes titles
http://www.teachingbooks.net/titlesearch.cgi?id=3604&a=1&crc=1

Children's Literature Comprehensive Database additional search results for subject African Americans Juvenile Fiction http://ezproxy.twu.edu:2294/cgi-bin/member/search/r?./temp/~QAVEyR:@term+@subj+African+Americans+Juvenile+fiction.
Nikki Grimes Official Website http://www.nikkigrimes.com/

Images credited to Amazon.com and Official Site of Nikki Grimes