Escape to Freedom Literature Circle

Kit contains 6 copies of each book. LOCATION: ST. Elizabeth Ann Seton

HAISLIP, PHYLLIS HALL

Lottie's Courage : a contraband slave's story

Ten-year-old Lottie is sold away from her mother at a slave auction in Williamsburg, Virginia. Bought by the evil slave trader Nephus Slye, Lottie travels south tied to other slaves. The uncertainty of her future leads Lottie to attempt escape. With Weza, an older woman who befriends her, Lottie slips away in the darkness. Morning finds the slave trader and dogs closing in.

HURMENCE, BELINDA

A Girl Called Boy

Blanceh Overtha Yancey goes by the name Boy. She hates her real name -- a tribute to her great-grandmothers, who were slaves. Boy had nothing for disdain for her ancestors. She can't believe the way they let themselves be pushed around. No one could make her a slave.

But that's before she somehow slips back in time to the year 1853 and takes the place of Overtha, a runaway. Now Boy is on the run from the ruthless slave catcher and his bloodhounds and hoping to find a way back to her own life. But first she'll have to survive life as a slave, in all its terror, deprivation and brutality.

RL: 6.1 GRL: U

RUBY, LOIS

Steal Away

When twelve-year-old Dana Shannon starts to strip away wallpaper in her family's old house, she's unprepared for the surprise that awaits her. A hidden room -- containing a human skeleton! How did such a thing get there? And why was the tiny room sealed up?

With the help of the diary found in the room, Dana learns her house was once a station on the Underground Railroad. The young woman whose remains Dana discovered was Lizbet Charles, a conductor and former slave. As the scene shifts between Dana's world and 1856, the story of the families that lived in the house unfolds. But as pieces of the puzzle begin to fall into place, one haunting question remains -- why did Lizbet Charles die?

RL : 5.1

SCHWARTZ, VIRGINIA FRANCES

Crossing to Freedom

Just eleven when he flees from his Georgia plantation, Solomon avoids the slavecatchers and reaches the border separating the United States from Canada. But his grandfather -- his only remaining family -- has been injured and would not survive the crossing. If Solomon does reach Canada, how ill he make his way without Grandpa Jacob at his side?

RL: 4.9 GRL: T

SCHWARTZ, VIRGINIA FRANCES

If I Just Had Two Wings

Born on a plantation in Alabama, thirteen-year-old Phoebe has always dreamed of leaving her life as a slave. While picking cotton, she learns of a way to escape to the north, and so begins her treacherous flight to Canada.

RL: 4.1 GRL: T

WYETH, SHARON DENNIS

Freedom's Wings : Corey's Underground Railroad Diary

In Book One of his diary, Corey Birdsong's fate changes when his father flees the Kentucky plantation where they are slaves. Now Corey and his mother must head towards freedom too, along the Underground Railroad.

RL: 3.2 GRL: P

Kit also includes 1 copy of the following:

Traveled on the Undeground Railroad

Courage to Run

Under the Quilt