Peace, Locomotion

Starred review from December 1, 2008
Following the character introduced in Locomotion,
Woodson switches from poetry to letters to show how 12-year-old Lonnie Collins Motion, aka Locomotion, maintains a bond with his younger sister, Lili. He reminds her of their past: “There was a time before your foster mama came and said, 'I’ll take the little girl but I don’t want no boys.’ ” Besides missing his sister and their late parents, Lonnie has other problems to cope with (his foster mother’s son returns from Iraq disabled and traumatized). In his letters, Lonnie shares the big and small details of his days, works through philosophical struggles (a friend tells him that “Miss Edna was my mama now”), and includes some of the tender poems he composes. Although the epistolary motif makes for some stilted writing, Woodson creates a full-bodied character in kind, sensitive Lonnie. Readers will understand his quest for peace, and appreciate the hard work he does to find it. Ages 9–12.

Starred review from January 1, 2009
Gr 4-6-Readers of "Locomotion" (Putnam, 2003) will welcome the chance to revisit Lonnie's world. Written as letters from Lonnie to his sister, Lili, who is in a different foster home, the story's backdrop is the unnamed war in which his foster brother Jenkins is fighting. When war directly affects the family, the 12-year-old begins to hope and pray for peace and to grapple with its meaning. Mature readers will see, also, the steps Lonnie is taking as he moves toward peace with himself and his circumstances. While his confusion, pain, and loss are at times palpable, so too are the moments of comfort, love, and sheer joy. As Lonnie's life becomes more and more interwoven with the lives of his foster brothers, his understanding of the meaning of family deepens and grows. The small details of his days drop readers into his Brooklyn neighborhood, surrounded by characters who seem to walk right off the page. Moving, thought-provoking, and brilliantly executed, this is the rare sequel that lives up to the promise of its predecessor. Serving as bookends to the body of the text are two poems in which Lonnie describes peace in everyday terms. In his words, "Peace is the good stuff/That happens to all of us/Sometimes.""Faith Brautigam, Gail Borden Public Library District, Elgin, IL"

Copyright 2009 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

December 15, 2008
Grades 4-7 In a moving companion to the National Book Award Finalist Locomotion (2003), Lonnie, now in sixth grade, speaks in letters to his beloved little sister, Lili. The siblings are still heartbroken about their separation, which followed the death of their parents in a fire. Both kids are now safe in loving foster families in their Brooklyn neighborhood, with friends and supportive teachers at school. After Lonnies foster brother returns home injured from war, the contrast between the peaceful home and the tragedy of war feels savage. While this does not have Locomotions poetic form, the spare, beautiful proseboth the dialogue and the fast first-person narrativeis as lyrical as the first book. The simple words are packed with longing and are eloquent about the little things people dont think real hard about, little things that reveal the big issues of family, community, displacement, war, and peace.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2008, American Library Association.)

July 1, 2009
Lonnie Collins Motion (Locomotion) continues his story in letters to his younger sister, who lives with a different foster family. He writes honestly and unsentimentally about their parents, his friends, and his foster brother fighting in Iraq. Lonnie's yearning for peace--for himself and his sister, for his foster family, for the world--comes across subtly yet powerfully.

(Copyright 2009 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

January 1, 2009
In Locomotion (rev. 3/03) eleven-year-old Lonnie Collins Motion told his story in a collection of sixty poems. In this sequel, he continues his story not in poems but in letters he writes to his younger sister, Lili. Lonnie's writing still grows from his memories of their parents and how much he misses them and his sister, who lives with a different foster family. Here, Lonnie also misses his fifth-grade teacher, kind Ms. Marcus, who taught him to write poetry. His sixth-grade teacher tells him he's not a poet until he's published a poem; luckily, she leaves midyear, but it takes Lonnie a while to regain his confidence after that one thoughtless comment. Lonnie also writes about his friends at school and about his foster family, Miss Edna and her adult sons Rodney (who has moved back home) and Jenkins (who's fighting in Iraq). When Jenkins returns home, he is minus a leg, but in this admirably unsentimental novel Jenkins comes to appreciate that he has gained a little brother, one who shows him that it's possible to keep on living despite devastating losses. As in the first book, Lonnie's honesty makes readers believe in him and his writing; that his yearning for peace -- for himself and his sister, for his foster family, for the world -- comes across so subtly yet so powerfully is a testament to Woodson's strength as a writer.

(Copyright 2009 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)