Love Thy Neighbor: the Tory Diary of Prudence Emerson
"This is not the life I imagined I would have." So laments Prudence  Emerson, an inquisitive, distinctly non-prudent 13-year-old girl from  Massachusetts who wants to be cheerful but who must, along with her Tory  family, live in fear of her Patriot neighbors in the months leading up  to the American Revolution. Like the other books in the Dear America  series, Ann Turner'sLove Thy Neighboris recounted in diary  form--a fictional diary that reveals the innermost thoughts of a young  woman while painting a vivid picture of the times in which she lived.  The innate complexities of the conflicts between Tories and Patriots are  clearly presented, and readers will certainly gain a new understanding  of the challenges of overthrowing foreign rule and beginning a democracy  from the rarely explored perspective of a family "on the wrong side" of  the war. Readers will also learn about daily colonial life--when bacon  came from the pigs one owned, where ink was made from ink powder or  maple bark, where girls were expected to embroider, wear corsets, scrub  floors, go to church on Sundays, and generally mind their manners. Pru  is a strong, spirited heroine whom readers will cheer on as she endures  alienation from her Patriot friends, the sickness of her little sister,  rising hostility, and ultimately, being uprooted from the home she loves  to flee the danger of war.A note in the back further illuminates life in the Colonies, as do  historical illustrations and a note from the author about her own family  connection to this turbulent time. Two other fictional diaries set  during the Revolutionary War are Kristiana Gregory's Dear America bookThe Winter of Red Snow:  The Revolutionary War Diary of Abigail Jane Stewartand Barry  Denenberg's My Name is America bookThe Journal of William  Thomas Emerson: A Revolutionary War Patriot. (Ages 9 to 14)--Karin Snelson