The Newbery Medal and Coretta Scott King Award-winning classic about a boy who decides to hit the road to find his father--from Christopher Paul Curtis, author of The Watsons Go To Birmingham--1963, a Newbery and Coretta Scott King Honoree.
It's 1936, in Flint Michigan. Times may be hard, and ten-year-old Bud may be a motherless boy on the run, but Bud's got a few things going for him:
1. He has his own suitcase full of special things.
2. He's the author of
Bud Caldwell's Rules and Things for Having a Funner Life and Making a Better Liar Out of Yourself.
3. His momma never told him who his father was, but she left a clue: flyers advertising Herman E. Calloway and his famous band, the Dusky Devastators of the Depression!!!!!!
Bud's got an idea that those flyers will lead him to his father. Once he decides to hit the road to find this mystery man, nothing can stop him--not hunger, not fear, not vampires, not even Herman E. Calloway himself.
AN ALA BEST BOOK FOR YOUNG ADULTS
AN ALA NOTABLE CHILDREN'S BOOK
AN IRA CHILDREN'S BOOK AWARD WINNER
NAMED TO 14 STATE AWARD LISTS
"The book is a gem, of value to all ages, not just the young people to whom it is aimed." --
The Christian Science Monitor "Will keep readers engrossed from first page to last." --
Publishers Weekly, Starred
"Curtis writes with a razor-sharp intelligence that grabs the reader by the heart and never lets go. . . . This highly recommended title [is] at the top of the list of books to be read again and again." --
Voice of Youth Advocates, Starred
"It's funny how ideas are, in a lot of ways they're just like seeds. Both of them start real, real small and then ... woop, zoop, sloop ... before you can say Jack Robinson, they've gone and grown a lot bigger than you everthought they could." So figures scrappy 10-year-old philosopher Bud--"not Buddy"--Caldwell, an orphan on the run from abusive foster homes and Hoovervilles in 1930s Michigan. And the idea that's planted itself in his head is that Herman E. Calloway, stand-up bass player for the Dusky Devastators of the Depression, is his father.
Guided only by a flyer for one of Calloway's shows--a small, blue posterthat had mysteriously upset his mother shortly before she died--Bud setsoff to track down his supposed dad, a man he's never laid eyes on. And,being 10, Bud--not--Buddy gets into all sorts of trouble along the way,barely escaping a monster-infested woodshed, stealing a vampire's car andeven getting tricked into "busting slob with a real live girl." ChristopherPaul Curtis exhibits his skill for capturing the language and feel of anera and creates an authentic, touching, often hilarious voice in littleBud. (Ages 8 to 12) --Paul Hughes
