Johnson attended Kent State University and has worked with Volunteers in Service to America (VISTA), Ravenna, OH, as a child development worker, 1981-82; and is currently a free-lance writer of children's books.

The First Part Last
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Angela Johnson

ISBN: 0689849222
Format: Hardcover, 131pp
Pub. Date: June 2003
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's
Age Range: Young Adult

"Author Angela Johnson follows up her Coretta Scott King Award–winning novel, Heaven, with this absorbing prequel about a single teen struggling to accept his new paternal role."
—The Barnes & Noble Review

Bobby is a typical urban New York City teenager -- impulsive, eager, restless. For his sixteenth birthday he cuts school with his two best buddies, grabs a couple of slices at his favorite pizza joint, catches a flick at a nearby multiplex, and gets some news from his girlfriend, Nia, that changes his life forever: He's going to be a father. Suddenly things like school and house parties and fun times with friends are replaced by visits to Nia's pediatrician and countless social workers who all say that the only way for Nia and Bobby to lead a normal life is to put their baby up for adoption. Then tragedy strikes Nia, and Bobby finds himself in the role of single, teenage father. Because his child -- their child -- is all that remains of his lost love.

With powerful language and keen insight, Johnson tells the story of a young man's struggle to figure out what "the right thing" is and then to do it. The result is a gripping portrayal of a single teenage parenthood from the point of view of a young on the threshold of becoming a man.

 

Title: Heaven
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Date Published: August 1998

Winner of the 1999 Coretta Scott King Author Award. Marley has lived in heaven with her parents and her brother for 12 years since the accident. She can't imagine her life any other way, but she may have to. Does Marley have the perfect life, or is her life the perfect lie?

What makes a person who she is? Is it her name, the people she lives with, or is blood the only link to identity? Marley, 14, suddenly plunges head first into these complex questions when she discovers that the people she's been living with her entire life aren't her real parents. Butchy is not her real brother, and her mysterious Uncle Jack, who has been writing her short but beautiful letters for as long as she can remember, turns out to be her real, very absent father. In spare, often poetic prose reminiscent of Patricia MacLachlan's work, Johnson relates Marley's insightful quest into what makes a family. Her extreme anger with her supposed parents, who turn out to be her aunt and uncle, for not telling her the truth, for not being the perfect family that she'd always thought them to be, wars with her knowledge that not even her friend Shoogy Maple's model family is as perfect and beautiful as it seems. The various examples of "family" Marley encounters make her question what's real, what's true, what makes sense, and if any of that really matters as much as the love she continues to feel for her parents in spite of their seeming betrayal. Johnson exhibits admirable stylistic control over Marley's struggle to understand a concept that is often impossible to understand or even to define. -- Linda Bindner, formerly at Athens Clarke County Library, Georgia

Gr 5-7 These verses by the versatile African-American writer give readers glimpses at her years growing up in the small town of Shorter, AL. Through prose poetry and colloquial speech, Johnson recalls skinny-dipping, the soft Alabama breeze, dirt roads, and red dusty porches. She presents vivid images-mothers stripping their children in the Wash-a-Teria to launder their clothes; houses smelling of "cinnamon and dead flowers;" getting up enough nerve to ask the secret of growing old. She touches on topics such as Vietnam, racism, and the Black Panthers, but also recalls dancing in the woods with a "boom box blasting through the trees." This slim volume just may open up increased awareness and understanding about the way things were-and how they sometimes still are.-Sharon Korbeck, Waupaca Area Public Library, WI (School Library Journal)

Winner of the 1994 Coretta Scott King Author Award.

One of the best-reviewed novels for young adults in 1993, this powerful debut is reminiscent of Terry McMillan's Waiting to Exhale. This story spans three generations of African-American women and their struggle to find a common ground for sharing love, friendship, and hardships. Young Adult.

The bond between grandparent and grandchild transcends time, and sometimes transcends an adult's sense of logic, reaching a deeper level of truth. In this story, a small child imagines a future when he will be old with his Granddaddy and will sit beside him in a rocking chair and talk about everything. They will go fishing, drink cool water from a jug, and play cards ``till the lightning bugs shine in the trees.'' The poignant reality that time will never allow these two to coexist at the same age is softened by the fact that they do not have to be the same age in order to share happy times. What the boy dreams of doing with his Granddaddy someday are the same things that they are doing now. This tender story is complemented by Soman's beautifully executed watercolors, which vibrate with life and love. The African-American child and grandfather are distinct individuals, yet also universal figures, recognizable to anyone who has ever shared the bond of family love across generations. --Anna DeWind, Milwaukee Public Library (School Library Journal)