Like Vanessa

Tami Charles, Vanessa Brantley-Newton

eBook - 2018

Middle graders will laugh and cry with thirteen-year-old Vanessa Martin as she tries to be like Vanessa Williams, the first black Miss America.In this semi-autobiographical debut novel set in 1983, Vanessa Martin's real-life reality of living with family in public housing in Newark, New Jersey is a far cry from the glamorous Miss America stage. She struggles with a mother she barely remembers, a grandfather dealing with addiction and her own battle with self-confidence. But when a new teacher at school coordinates a beauty pageant and convinces Vanessa to enter, Vanessa's view of her own world begins to change. Vanessa discovers that her own self-worth is more than the scores of her talent performance and her interview answers, an...d that she doesn't need a crown to be comfortable in her own skin and see her own true beauty."It's such an honor to be the focal point of this wonderful book! Without a doubt, it will be inspiring to a new generation of young, talented... more