British author Jon Walter (Close to the Wind) skillfully tells a thoroughly riveting, elegantly nuanced story of an orphan sold into slavery in the Civil War South. My Name Is Not Friday grew from Walter's vision of "a boy, alone in darkness, thinking he'd been taken by God." That would be 12-year-old Samuel Jenkins, a freeborn black boy in Mississippi who's been hauled off from Father Mosely's orphanage by a licorice-breathed slave dealer. Normally it's the "bad boys" like his little brother Joshua who are sold off first, but Samuel is a studious, deeply devout boy who tries his hardest to be good. His hasty decision to shoulder the blame for something he's sure his brother did changes his life forever. Samuel is renamed "Friday" and sold for $600.
Adjusting to life of cotton-picking, and hiding his true identity and education, takes some doing, but he forges relationships with his fellow slaves and with the plantation owner's lonely 12-year-old son, Gerald. Walter explores the "multiplicity of truths" of Civil War history, including many who try to rationalize their role in the dehumanizing practice of slavery, such as those who believe "the two races working together for the good of both" is God's intention. Teen readers will be cheering for Samuel in this insightful, hopeful, gut-wrenching and truly fine novel. --Karin Snelson, children's & YA editor, Shelf Awareness