Bound To Stay Bound

School Library Journal - 05/01/1996 K-Gr 3--This beautifully illustrated and moving fictional story can be used to introduce Harriet Tubman and the injustice of slavery to young audiences. Minty (Harriet's cradle name was Araminta) is a spirited child who hides in order to shirk the commands of the temperamental Mrs. Brodas. When she spills a pitcher of cider, the mistress of the plantation throws the girl's beloved rag doll into the fire and sends her to work in the fields. There, she disobeys the overseer by freeing some muskrats from their traps and is whipped for her willfulness. After this incident, Minty's father takes her dreams of escape seriously and teaches her to survive in the wild. She is tempted to take a horse from in front of the Brodas house and to flee, but hesitates and loses the opportunity. Nevertheless, she vows that someday she will run away. An author's note tells of the realization of her dream and her work with the Underground Railroad. Pinkney's illustrations are outstanding, even when compared to his other fine work. His paintings, done in pencil, colored-pencils, and watercolor, use light and shadow to great effect, and his depictions of Minty are particularly powerful and expressive. This is a dramatic story that will hold listeners' interest and may lead them to biographical material such as David A. Adler's A Picture Book of Harriet Tubman (Holiday, 1992) and Ann McGovern's Wanted Dead or Alive (Scholastic, 1991). However, with so many real-life incidents from Tubman's childhood to choose from, one has to wonder why Schroeder decided to create fictional ones.--Louise L. Sherman, Anna C. Scott School, Leonia, NJ - Copyright 1996 Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and/or School Library Journal used with permission.

Booklist - 02/15/1996 Set on the Maryland plantation where Harriet Tubman (Minty) was raised a slave, this fictionalized story dramatizes what daily life was like for her as a child. Schroeder's words are clear and strong. There's no gracious big house here, no happy slave. The angry Missus sends the difficult slave child Minty to work in the fields. When the overseer orders her to check the muskrat traps, she sets the animals free and is whipped for it. Pinkney's realistic portraits are powerful, and, as in John Henry (1994), the dappled double-page landscapes connect the strong child hero with the might of the natural world. Her mother tells her to pat the lion, but her father knows she means to run away, and several idyllic paintings show him teaching her to read the night sky and swim in the river and survive in the woods. The blend of fact and fiction is occasionally problematic (was she really planning escape at eight years old, or was that age chosen to suit the picture-book audience?), but kids will be moved by the picture of secret childhood rebellion in someone who grew up to lead hundreds to freedom. (Reviewed Feb. 15, 1996) - Copyright 1996 Booklist.