Sounder by William H. Armstrong is a John Newbery Medal winner.

Sounder takes place in a time when African-Americans didn't have chances for a good education or the ability to find good paying jobs. Most of them were very poor. The father in the story steals food to feed his family and is caught by the sheriff and his deputies. He is then sent far away to serve his sentence by manual labor in fields.

Sounder is the family dog who follows after the father and risks his life to protect him. The main character in the book is a young boy who has lost both his father and his dog. He searches for both of them. When Sounder returns, the boy sets off again in search of his father.

Rating:

This book is excellent! I love adventure stories, but this one also made history more real to me. Sometimes when time passes by, we don't clearly understand our past. To learn by the mistakes of the past, we need to remember what history has to tell us. In this book, I am reminded that all people have not always been treated equally. I can't make up for the mistakes of the past, but they help me to understand the importance of how I lead my life. I highly recommend this book. It can be purchased through Amazon's secured web site.