Starred Review This year marks the fiftieth anniversary of the watershed summer of 1964, when civil rights workers flooded into some of the most socially oppressive areas of Mississippi. These student volunteers opened schools, registered voters, and promoted positive reform. Set against the backdrop of the puzzling disappearance of three of these young volunteers (known by the FBI case file as "Mississippi Burning"), Rubin's crackling narrative chronicles the work of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee amid threats by the Ku Klux Klan. It's no surprise, coming from Rubin, that this reads like suspenseful d almost unbelievable ction, filled with courageous characters, shocking turns of events, and potent emotion. Fascinating and copious details are drawn from the author's personal interviews with key figures, oral histories, and primary documents, all meticulously sourced in the back matter. Design is the sole weak spot: nonglossy pages and spreads of unadorned text are not especially welcoming. The photographs themselves, though, are well chosen, as are the reproductions of leaflets, reports, and papers, all of which bring vivid life to the events and speak to the human aspects of history. An educator's guide available on the publisher's website offers countless more leads for deeper research and lesson-plan inspiration. This well-researched and heartfelt work covers every angle, thereby honoring the brave inroads made by activists a half century ago.

Gr 9 Up-Fifty years after the Freedom Summer murders, this meticulously researched, compellingly told account covers an incredible moment in history. Mickey Schwerner, Andrew Goodman, and James Chaney were three young civil rights workers who decided to work for the Council of Federated Organizations (COFO) to confront bigotry in Mississippi and register African Americans to vote. They left for Meridian, accompanied by student volunteers from across the United States, (where only 6.4 percent of eligible African American voters were registered.) Schwerner, Goodman, and Chaney were killed by Klansmen after being arrested. Their deaths deepened the conviction of the others and served to engender incredible strides in the forward momentum of the civil rights movement. This work gives a real sense of the time and place, the issues and the opposing sides, and the impact on the nation. Including myriad period photos and drawings, facsimiles of reports and records, meticulous source notes, an extensive bibliography, picture credits, and an extensive index, this title is the epitome of excellent historical reporting, with the human element never forgotten.— Ann Welton, Grant Elementary School, Tacoma, WA

With meticulous research and documentation, Rubin focuses broadly on Freedom Summer: the organizers, the volunteers, the voter registration drives, etc. She conducted many interviews, in person, by telephone, and by email, with people who were directly involved, and their firsthand accounts--along with copious archival black-and-white photographs--bring the events to life. Timeline, websites. Bib., ind.

In time for the 50th anniversary of the pivotal civil rights event, Rubin presents heroes, villains and everyday people in 1964 Mississippi. Freedom schools, voter-registration drives and murders drew national attention to Mississippi during the Freedom Summer, and actions there affected the civil rights movement elsewhere, all culminating in the Voting Rights Act, signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1965. The number of eligible black voters rose from 6.4 percent prior to Freedom Summer to 60 percent by the end of 1966. Two threads weave through Rubin's narrative—a detailed story of the murders of civil rights workers Mickey Schwerner, James Chaney and Andrew Goodman and a less focused, anecdotal picture of freedom schools and voter registration, drawing on extensive personal interviews. Though archival material and many photographs are included, too many pages of dense text are unrelieved by visuals. The extensive research is well-documented, and young readers may find much of interest in the websites recommended. Overall, the account is accessible and passionate, taking the events of that violent summer into the present, when, in 2005, 80-year-old, wheelchair-bound Edgar Ray Killen was found guilty of the murders of Schwerner, Chaney and Goodman and sentenced to three 20-year jail terms. A fascinating treatment of a key civil rights moment. (Nonfiction. 10-14)

In honor of the fiftieth anniversary of the civil rights project in Mississippi, Rubin has created a narrative retelling of the events and occurrences from the summer of 1964. Chock-full of primary sources, such as photographs, memos sent to applicants regarding the growing tensions in Mississippi, and pencil drawings depicting various settings from Neshoba County, Mississippi, Freedom Summer is organized in a time-line fashion, from June 1964 until late August 1964. Younger readers (publisher recommends ages ten and up) will be exposed to the violence that was widespread throughout the South during the Civil Rights movement, but not in a gratuitously graphic manner. Also included within the title are remarks about our society today and where we stand in regard to civil rights. According to Charles McLaurin, one of the founding members of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, which was formed in the summer of 1964, as a result of the increasing civil rights problems, "The Movement never stops."An extensive time line, appendixes, source notes, bibliography, and index are also present, which is helpful for those readers who need further information. Rubin has done an excellent job of presenting facts in a way that causes the reader to feel empathy for those who were persecuted based only on their skin color, as well as for those who volunteered to help others, simply because they felt compelled to stand up for fellow men.Beth H. Green.