Rating: 
Summary: Enjoyable Book
Review: This was an enjoyable book. Not a favorite but well worth the read.
Rating: 
Summary: I did not like this book.
Review: It was a collage of events and never really focused on one. I mean, the child's fascination with the swimming pool was understandable, but overall I just didn't get the book. It was not what I expected and I am wondering why did Oprah choose this?
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Summary: Very poetic read! Not for the "get-to-the-point" reader!
Review: Beautifully written! Great thought provoking novel. A simple read, but a passionate one as well. Thanks Oprah!
Rating:
Summary: Beautifully written, a bit vague
Review: This is a book full of powerful writing, of great depth, and I do recommend it with the proviso that it can be a little off-putting in its focus. The premise of the story is strong, and the mood building is very good, though the place to which it comes at the end left me somewhat unsatisfied. Still, it is a fine first effort and has some memorable qualities
Rating: 
Summary: A story simply well told.
Review: Some of the best books I've read have been told through the eyes of a child. This is an excellent example of such a tale. Children as narrators allow us to look at, hear, understand and misunderstand life around us without the should and should nots that cloud how we perceive things. This was a quick and pleasant read. It caused me to reflect on my own life around age 12, how I understood what was going on in the adult world around me and what impact that had on my life today. I look forward to sharing this with my own daughter in a few more years. It would make a great Mother-Daughter Book Club selection for girls around Johnnie Mae's age. I'm delighted that Oprah chose it as her book selection and that I have a signed first edition. Congratulations, Ms. Clarke
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Summary: Crazy about this book
Review: This is a rich, all consuming book that kept me turning pages day after day. Few books have touched me the way this one did. I recently finished A Star Called Henry, which I loved, and The Bingo Queens of Paradise, which I also loved, and I was desperately trying to find a book that would entertain me as they had. I found it in River Cross My Heart. Give us more like this Breena Clarke
Rating:
Summary: Great storytelling,filled with wisdom.
Review: Enjoyed this book, well worth the time. Breena Clarke is an excellent storyteller. "River" is filled with wisdom sayings and reflections on cultural traditions of Blacks from the South. Those insights reflect research done within Breena's family/the kind of listening research that many Blacks fail to do with the elders in their clans. The story of Johnnie Mae is a powerful one with lessons for young and old. I recommend teachers consider this for class assignments. This book will take off with reading clubs
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Summary: Absolutely a brilliant read, couldn't put it down.
Review: This was set in Georgetown, Washington DC and even though I'm not even from the US I'd spent time there and this book caught my eye. A wonderfully told tale about how how family and friends react to the death of a young child. Great first novel
Rating:
Summary: Enjoyable read
Review: The term "coming-of-age story" is probably highly over-used in Amazon reviews. However, that's truly the best way to describe this lovely story by Breena Clarke. Johnnie Mae has a fascination with water. It is near the water that her baby sister, Clara, dies; it is her fascination with the water that almost gets her arrested when she breaks into the white-only swimming pool; and it is her ability in the water that begins to break her out of the segregated world of 1925 Washington, DC. This book chronicles a year in Johnnie Mae's life when all of these events happen to her. Through these snapshots of her life, the reader is able to catch a glimpse of how segregated big-city life must have looked to a child. Overall, the book is very enjoyable, and will be a quick read - perhaps for a summer day at the beach?
Rating:
Summary: Enticing novel
Review: This is an enchanting novel about growing up in Georgetown in the 1920s. It is also an insight to life in the African-American culture back then. It is about a young girl finding her way in the times and finding her future and finding her voice. It is a thoroughly enjoyable novel ~~ beautifully written too. Johnnie Mae loves to swim. She longs to swim at the all-white swimming pool instead of the Potomac River. She would stare at the swimmers at the pool which is across the street from her Aunt Ina's house. Always working and always watching out for her youngest sister, Johnnie Mae longs for more. Then when Clara, her sister drowned one afternoon when all the kids were swimming at the river, Johnnie Mae tries to deal with her guilt and memories. She befriends a new girl who reminded her of Rat ~~ the nickname she has bestowed on her sister ~~ and they grow up. It is a neat insight to life back in the 1920s. It is beautifully written ~~ you see the world from Johnnie Mae's eyes as well as from her mother's eyes. It is a journey that lingers long after you've turned the last page. It's a book I highly recommend for everyone to read this summer! Perfect book for the poolside reading! 6-8-04
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