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 world begins to change. Vanessa discovers that her own self-worth is more than the scores of her talent performance and her interview answers, and that she doesn't need a crown to be comfortable in her own skin and see her own true beauty.
| ISBN: | 9781580898997 |
| Publication date: | 25th February 2019 |
| Author: | Tami Charles |
| Illustrator: | Vanessa BrantleyNewton |
| Publisher: | Charlesbridge |
| Format: | Paperback |
| Pagination: | 288 pages |
| Genres: |
Children's and Young Adult Fiction |