January 14, 2025 by Crown Books for Young Readers
E ARC provided by Edelweiss Plus
In Operation Sisterhood, we met Bo and and new stepsisters, Sunday and twins Lil and Lee, as they navigated their new life in a Harlem brownstone owned by their Auntie Sunflower. Now, we see the world from Sunday's point of view. Sunday, whose mother lives in London, is a song writer and aspiring detective, and has a great idea to put together a show for their neighborhood. Sunday's mother always reminds her that she shines, but Sunday, who often forgets her turn to make dinner and tries to put together combinations like sardines and Biscoff cookie butter, often has trouble believing in herself. The family has spent a lot of time refurbishing a local garden, which seems like the best place to put on such an extravaganza. Sunday's plans might be a little beyond her reach, as she promises that the event will have lots of celebrities. Luckily for her, teen star Talitha Thomas moves into the neighborhood, and agrees to help with the production! Sunday opens up auditions to everyone in the neighborhood, and there's a lot of interest, but Sunday has trouble organizing her thoughts and implementing a plan. Talitha isn't as much help as she would like, and can only meet for short periods. On top of this, Sunday and her sisters have a free schooling assignment to investigate historical free Black communities in the cities, and are supposed to travel around to them and gather information for a project. This does give Sunday some ideas about sharing different people's stories, and also makes her worry about her own neighborhood being gentrified. One of the outings that her parents encourage is one to the Morgan Library to see an exhibit about Lucille Clifton and Gwendolyn Brooks. Sunday has a growing number of projects she needs to organize, like writing a song for the sisters' band, the script for the show, etc., but procrastinates, although she is glad to see that the idea of the performance is making her neighborhood happy. When Talitha leaves suddenly for a job in London and doesn't let Sunday know, will the performance be able to go on?
Strengths: Sunday's family and neighborhood is filled with a wide array of talented, exuberant people who are invested in their community. Auntie Sunflower provides the family's home for free, Papa Charles runs a bookstore, Mama Hope draws maps for books and teaches cartography, and even Ms. Tyler keeps everyone on their toes by hanging out on her stoop. It's good to see a close knit neighborhood rally together around something like a community performance. I also really enjoyed all of the history that Sunday and her sisters discovered while working on their free schooling project. Younger readers really enjoy a bit of celebrity shine in books, so Talitha's life will be very interesting.
Weaknesses: I wish that Sunday would have learned more organizational skills from Bo, but did appreciate that there was a note at the back where she outlined a bit of what she needed to do!
What I really think: As someone who always secretly wanted to do a backyard carnival to raise money for muscular dystrophy and was never allowed, I was enthralled by Sunday's attempts to put together a community event. It seems that there should be a ton of middle grade books where characters do something similar, but I'm struggling to find them! Readers who enjoyed the first book will be glad to pick up this sequel.
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