Minty Lou Payson lived in a warm, secure child's world where there was plenty to eat and always someone to admire a new dress or a pretty ribbon in her hair. This was unusual for the early 1900's in Baltimore, Marland, because Minty Lou was black. However, her mother, Big Lou, was an exceptional individual, a forceful and energetic woman who had independently found herself a supervisory position in a hospital. Through Big Lou's encouragement and ambition, Minty Lou's future seemed assured. She would someday be able to be a nurse.
Then tragedy struck and the dream collapsed. Minty Lou's future, built as it was on the strength of one person, was shattered when both her mother and father were killed in a freak accident. In the aftermath of the accident, Minty Lou was lost in the shuffle. As she passed from relative to relative, long hidden jealousies over Big Lou's success came to the surface, and from being the center of attention Minty Lou became the unwelcome burden to homes where money was short and hope for the future nonexistent.
As Minty Lou gradually came to life again, she recognized that these new surroundings provided a great deal less than she was accustomed to. She had seen too much of the dream her mother had wanted for her, and she did not passively accept this change in her life. the result was growing suspicion and dislike from her relatives, who could not understand what more this child could want.
Author Olivia Coolidge, who has based this book on an actual life story, traces Minty Lou's uphill fight to regain the life that she knew with its day-to-day comforts and promises of a brighter future.
—from the dust jacket
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