Piecing Me Together by Renée Watson

This book by Renée Watson is about a girl named Jade who believes she must leave her poor neighborhood in order to succeed in her education, so when she moves to a new school, she joins a club called “Woman to Woman” where she has a mentor named Maxine. Even though joining the club was a good idea at first, it makes her feel even more judged. The first day of Woman to Woman, Maxine doesn’t even show up which leaves Jade devastated. Another time, the Woman to Women club went out to a museum but Maxine had to take a really “important” call from her ex boyfriend, Jon. Jade is now unsure of whether to quit Woman to Woman. Though Maxine has good intentions, she comes from a wealthy family and Jade feels pitied.

Jade always gives Maxine a second chance whenever Maxine messes up, but sometimes Jade gets frustrated and agitated.

Throughout this book, it has a very strong message about race and ethnicity. One example of this would be that, when Jade went to a shop, the shopkeeper asked her to put her bag up on the counter, but didn’t ask another customer who had an even bigger bag because that customer was white and Jade was black. This book also had a strong message about standing up for yourself. This was shown in the book when a teacher told Jade that she was keeping the line up at lunch, but she didn’t think she was, so she stood up for herself.

I liked how the chapters were short. Each chapter had a title which was a Spanish word, which was the meaning of that chapter. That was pretty cool!

Have you read any books about race and ethnicity? If so, which ones?