Road to Paris

Grimes, Nikki. Road to Paris. 2006. New York: G.P.Putnam's Sons.

Paris is a wonderful little girl who any reader will fall in love with. This heartwarming and yet heartbreaking story. Growing up in foster homes in which she was treated poorly and locked in closets, she had a fear of the dark but the only comforting thought from her ill life was the fact that her brother was by her side. Malcolm and Paris lived with the Boones' family in which the mother would beat Paris at any given moment. One day they had had enough so they decided to run away to the only family they had left, their grandmother. Once upon arriving they felt relieved yet sorrowful when they learned that she did not want to raise them because she was too old to start a family again. She called Children's Services and one morning Paris awoke to a man taking away her brother. She was sent to live with a strange family in Ossining. She was heartbroken and had to fight back the tears of not knowing what the future held and not knowing where her brother was located. She learned that she would be living with the Lincoln family and was scared to death at first. But after a few weeks things settled down and she slowly began to fall in love with her new mom and brothers. She made a friend at school and even enjoyed playing hide and seek with her new family members. The family taught her a very important lesson and that was to "keep God in her pocket". She learned to face hard things in her life and to get through them with the help of God. She started to form a stronger faith and knew she could get through anything with His help. Everything in her life was going good until she got a phone call that her mom was married again and wanted her back home. Paris felt confused about leaving her new loving family and going back home to live with her mom and brother. After many days of contemplating her choice, she boarded the train back towards her natural family.

Nikki Grimes writes a beautiful story and yet any reader will turn the last page wanting to know what the future will hold for this little girl. It leaves the reader with a sense of hope that she found God and now knows that she can get through anything with "God in her pocket". The story is realistic and could very well be the story of any girl in one of our public school classrooms. The bond between brother and sister is so powerful the reader will be thankful for their own family members and their relationships in their life. Although, the story doesn't quite have a happy ending, I would recommend this as a great read.