Let’s meet Kizzy Ann Stamps and her dog, Shag. Kizzy Ann is called Moon Child by her mama because when she was younger the neighbor boy accidentally let his scythe drop and her face was cut from just under her eye to her mouth in a crescent moon shape. She has never forgiven Frank Charles for her injury.
Mrs. Warren, Kizzy’s old teacher, encouraged all her students to write to their new teacher at the white school. Miss Anderson learns a lot about the life of someone that has the most special dog in the world and a huge scar that people stare at and the many differences between her world and Kizzy Ann’s.
It is 1963 and the schools were integrating but attitudes were far from love thy neighbor.
Kizzy’s brother, James, doesn’t have any teachers like Miss Andersonnin high school. He said his teacher would not put the integrated students on the roll and they wouldn’t even give them books! It was like they were invisible. His JV football team didn’t lose a game but they were never mentioned in the newspaper. Losing a dream is hard. James and his buddies get into mischief. They excite the neighbor’s cows and the cows plow down Frank Charles’ daddy’s shed. Kizzy Ann stared in disbelief when Frank Charles took the blame for what James and his friends had done.
When she asked him why he told her, “It was the right thing to do.”
The author, Jeri Watts, gives readers a look at life during a different era. Step with us into Kizzy Ann’s shoes. Some people do the right thing and others do not!
We meet a cantankerous Scotsman, Mr. McKenna, who trains Shag and Kizzy Ann so they can perform in a dog trial. Will Kizzy Ann and Shag even be allowed to compete?
In the midst of dog training and spelling bees the president is assassinated.
Kizzy Ann expresses her emotions so well. “I cannot believe the upside-downness of the world. I could feel a blanket of sadness covering our school and our state and our nation.”
The kindness of this little book will touch your heart! When Frank Charles’ mama has a seizure and he goes berserk, Kizzy Ann takes charge and calms him down and helps his mama in a gentle way that she’d seen her Sunday School teacher do for a student that had seizures.
It was the right thing to do. Isn’t it funny that we never forget doing the right thing? You won’t regret meeting Kizzy Ann Stamps!