Uncertain glory 1944 cast
Joe Woods has always had a gift for words and when he inherited a printing press he out that gift to good use writing and printing a local newspaper As the civil war approaches Joe struggles to pay back a loan he took to get his business up and running without enough revenue he will lose his business This book set in Maine has a pretty wide audience upper elementary through lower highschool Wait provides Historical Notes at the end which share about the background for the story 210 Lea Wait brought the days preceding the Civil War to life as told through the eyes of young Joe Woods 210 Set on the Maine coast at the brink of the Civil War this story told from the point of view of a 13 year old newspaper editor captures important dilemmas including patriotism race relations child welfare spiritualism addiction loyalty 210 Young Adult teen book I read because I have followed the author and really liked her adult mystery writing Nice story Held my interest Two teenagers are running a printing press in Maine as the Civil War breaks out The boys witness prejudice child abuse and the fears that the war will sweep into their small Maine town 210 Well crafted look back at a few days at the start of the American Revolution Discusses racial issues and the spiritualism craze Uses the setting and historical aspects to its advantage I really enjoyed the is she or isn t she will they or won t they aspects of the story Engaging and informative of the time 210 A young boy full of dreams and responsibility towards his friends a possible charlatan medium and a community on the brink of the Civil War This is a book about choices and commitment Perhaps there were too many characters for a novel of this length This could have been longer allowing for the many characters to be better developed or it could have addressed fewer characters at depth Still I enjoyed this bit of historical fiction There are lessons about maturity compassion for others honesty and self sacrifice throughout all of this story the tone is not heavy handed or moralistic however Events that we learn about come through the eyes of the 13 year old Joe Wood an ambitious young newspaper writer who is scrambling throughout the book to pay off his start up loan His work at the press allows us to see the events and places of pre Civil War Maine and it s full of its own prejudices conniving people positive values and respectable citizens We learn about history with this new perspective and I suspect many Young Adults or preteens will enjoy reading this 210 Oh my that Lea Wait knows how to bring history to life She starts with a real person who s diary she read and then spins a wonderful fictional story around that character It s 1861 in Wiscasset Maine and 13 year old Joe Wood runs his own newspaper but if he doesn t make enough money to pay off the money he borrowed to start the paper he ll lose his business And when you charge one cent for a one page flier of news and you have to handset all the type it seems nearly impossible to pay off 22 dollars of debt in less than 2 weeks But the Civil War is starting and men from Wiscasset are asked to enlist plus there s a mysterious 12 year old traveling spiritualist who claims to speak with the dead in town lots of news for a small town Maybe Joe can earn the money but with unexpected events including a missing friend Joe and the reader are left with uncertainty as the story unfolds Wait s details are rich and create a wonderful sense of time and place fascinating to see how children s roles in the world were so different back then The last third of the story is fast paced and satisfying the novel does begin a little slower setting up the story and the actual ending felt a bit abrupt But overall a delightful trip back in time 210 I wrote UNCERTAIN GLORY because I loved the idea that Joe Wood a real boy in April 1861 published his town s newspaper for about a year That he did so during the critical days of Fort Sumter and the beginning of the Civil War was too good a story to miss I read Joe s newspaper and his diary now in the Maine Historical Society s archives and decided to also include Joe s close friend Charlie Farrar who helped Joe with the newspaper but who chose a different future from Joe s and who saw the war as an exciting adventure Joe was a life long newsman I added the character Owen a 9 year old African American boy who helps at the newspaper to show how free blacks in the north responded to the war and how people responded to them Nell a 12 year old traveling spiritualist is based on several girl spiritualists of the period when spiritualism was taken seriously even at the White House All the events described in UNCERTAIN GLORY related to the Civil War did take place in Wiscasset Maine I tried to bring 1861 to life to show what history books may miss or make dull I hope I was successful A special note to teachers and home schoolers a teachers guide to UNCERTAIN GLORY and suggestions for how it can be connected to the common core curriculum are on my website 210 Uncertain Glory is the story of Joe Wood a thirteen year old boy who publishes his own newspaper in the little town of Wiscasset Maine in 1861 Joe has help from his friend Charlie and a younger African American boy named Owen At the start of the Civil War Joe has almost business than he can handle with the war news and the arrival in town of a young spiritualist Nell who claims she can speak with the dead Joe and Charlie suspect Nell is a fraud but when Owen goes missing Joe seeks Nell s help to find him. Uncertain glory of an april day This is a quick exciting well researched read based upon actual real people and the author does an excellent job of layering in the historical detail needed to understand the story without resorting to info dumps or awkward dialogue exchanges I especially enjoyed the spiritualism aspect of the story and loved trying to guess for myself whether Nell was legitimately speaking with the spirits or duping the entire town The book also briefly touches on racism as it existed in mid nineteenth century Maine which is a great addition that really rounds out Owen s character Also did I mention how gorgeous this book is Hardcover with lovely art on the dust jacket and maps inside both the front and back covers maps I m such a nerd for a good map 210 Interesting take on the arrival of the Civil War I live in Wiscasset so perhaps I am biased but I think Wait did an admirable job of showing the excitement and trepidation that came along with the arrival of the Civil War in small town Maine 210
Joe Wood has big dreams He wants to be a newspaperman and though he s only thirteen he s already borrowed money for the equipment to start his own press But it s April 1861 and the young nation is teetering on the brink of a civil war He has to help Owen his young assistant deal with the challenges of being black in a white world torn apart by color He needs to talk his best friend Charlie out of enlisting He wants to help a young spiritualist Nell whose uncle claims can she speak to the dead And when Owen disappears it s up to Joe to save him Lea Wait skillfully draws on the lives of real people in Maine s history to tell this story of three young adults touched by war and the tensions it brings forcing them into adulthood before they may be ready Uncertain GloryMaine author Lea Wait writes the NYT praised 8 book Shadows Antique Print Mystery series the latest of which is SHADWS ON A MORNING IN MAINE and the USA Today best selling Mainely Needlepoint series which debuted with TWISTED THREADS in January 2015 and was followed by THREADS OF EVIDENCE in August 2015 THREAD AND GONE in January 2016 DANGLING BY A THREAD in late October 2016 and TIGHTENING THE THREADS in March 2017 Wait also writes acclaimed historical novels for ages 8 and up set in 19th century Maine the latest of which UNCERTAIN GLORY takes place in a small northern town during the first two weeks of the Civil War Leas LIVING AND WRITING ON THE COAST OF MAINE about being an author and living year round in Maine with Maine author Lea Wait writes the NYT praised 8 book Shadows Antique Print Mystery series the latest of which is SHADWS ON A MORNING IN MAINE and the USA Today best selling Mainely Needlepoint series which debuted with TWISTED THREADS in January 2015 and was followed by THREADS OF EVIDENCE in August 2015 THREAD AND GONE in January 2016 DANGLING BY A THREAD in late October 2016 and TIGHTENING THE THREADS in March 2017 Wait also writes acclaimed historical novels for ages 8 and up set in 19th century Maine the latest of which UNCERTAIN GLORY takes place in a small northern town during the first two weeks of the Civil War Lea s LIVING AND WRITING ON THE COAST OF MAINE about being an author and living year round in Maine with a husband who s an artist also includes writing tips Lea did her undergraduate work at Chatham College now University in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania and her graduate work at New York University While she was raising the four daughters she adopted as a single parent she worked as a manager for ATT Now she writes full time and speaks at schools and libraries She loves rowing visiting historical sites and of course reading and writing See her website site_link www.
Uncertain glorylight teaching com and the blog she writes with other Maine Mystery writers site_link friend her on FB and Goodreads and if you d like to be on her email list to find out when her next book will be published send her your email address write to her at leawait roadrunner.leawait.com site_link
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