Celeste, a mouse longing for a real home, becomes a source of inspiration to teenaged Joseph, assistant to the artist and naturalist John James Audubon, at a New Orleans, Louisiana, plantation in 1821.
Judah's dream of becoming a successful shopkeeper comes true but, when God spares his life after being wounded during the War of 1812, he begins using his riches to secretly help others. Includes historical and biographical note.
Volunteering with her friend Cecile at a crowded New Orleans orphanage during the yellow fever epidemic of 1853, Marie-Grace discovers that it is not just the orphans who need help.
With the help of her white friend Marie-Grace, Cecile, a well-to-do black girl in 1853 New Orleans, plans a secret adventure at a Mardi Gras costume ball.
Eleven-year-old Cécile Rey searches through many corners of 1854 New Orleans seeking a necklace, borrowed from her Tante Tay, that disappeared as she was exiting a crowded showboat. Includes facts about the 1850s.
"Charlotte leads her friends to New Orleans, where the resistance against the Empire is based. There, she must figure out where her true loyalties lie"--
Marie-Grace is excited that a well-known English opera company will perform at the very theater where she takes singing lessons from Aunt Océane, but as she and her friend Cécile help out backstage, the make disturbing discoveries.
"The fictionalized story about a group of starving, homeless kids in 1890s New Orleans who made their own instruments and started a band that historians now consider an important step in the development of jazz"--