FREEDOM SONGS

A Brooklyn teen-ager becomes a Civil Rights activist after witnessing the savage effects of racism. Easter, 1963: at a family gathering in the rural South, 19- year-old Uncle Pete announces, to the consternation of all, that he's going to be a Freedom Rider. Sheryl Williams, down with her parents for the holiday, has little ambition beyond being a ``fly girl,'' but her consciousness is raised after being driven away from a ``whites only'' water fountain and watching whites being served first. On a later trip, she sees family members turned away when they try to register to vote and participates in a lunch counter sit-in. Then Uncle Pete's Freedom School is bombed and he dies of injuries. Back in New York, Sheryl organizes a successful benefit concert for the Freedom Riders but realizes that her commitment to the movement is just beginning. Moore subtly and effectively describes the changing mixture of fear and resolution with which Sheryl faces white hostility, as well as the firm church and family relationships that are her foundation. She also presents the methods and nonviolent philosophy of the Civil Rights Movement as clearly as the abuses it aimed to correct. An uncompromising first novel that's easily strong enough to carry its educational load. (Fiction. 12-15)