Publisher Description
What if a school’s mascot is seen as racist, but not by everyone? In this compelling middle-grade novel in verse, two best-selling BIPOC authors tackle this hot-button issue.
In Rye, Virginia, just outside Washington, DC, people work hard, kids go to school, and football is big on Friday nights. An eighth-grade English teacher creates an assignment for her class to debate whether Rye’s mascot should stay or change. Now six middle schoolers—all with different backgrounds and beliefs—get involved in the contentious issue that already has the suburb turned upside down with everyone choosing sides and arguments getting ugly.
Told from several perspectives, listeners see how each student comes to new understandings about identity, tradition, and what it means to stand up for real change.
A Publishers Weekly Best Book of 2023
A New York Public Library Best Book of 2023
A National Public Radio “Books We Love” title of 2023
Download and start listening now!
About the Authors
Traci Sorell writes fiction and nonfiction books, as well as poems for children. Her debut nonfiction picture book, We Are Grateful: Otsaliheliga is a Junior Library Guild selection. She is an enrolled citizen of the Cherokee Nation and lives in northeastern Oklahoma where her tribe is located.
About the Narrators
Karen Chilton is a New York–based actor and writer and an accomplished voice-over artist and narrator. She has narrated dozens of audiobooks, won three AudioFile Earphones Awards, and in 2020 won the prestigious Audie Award for Best Nonfiction Narration. Her voice can be heard on numerous national network television, radio, and Internet advertising campaigns.
Soneela Nankani is an award-winning narrator with over three hundred titles in many different genres including Young Adult, Fantasy, Romance, Sci-Fi, and Nonfiction. She has garnered sixteen Earphones Awards, nominations for Audie and SOVAS awards, and was recently awarded AudioFile magazine’s Golden Voice Lifetime Achievement Honor. Her audiobooks have been featured in Best Audiobooks lists by AudioFile magazine and the Washington Post, among others. In her spare time, she loves to read (yes, really), learn languages, try new recipes, and travel. She lives in the DC area with her husband and two mischievous daughters.
Christopher Gebauer is a multifaceted actor who excels in both leading and character roles. He is a graduate of the Stella Adler Studio of Acting through the New York University Tisch School of the Arts.
Kyla Garcia is an AudioFile Earphones Award–winning narrator. Born and raised in Hoboken, New Jersey, she discovered acting at the age of eight when she played Lady Macbeth in a children’s adaptation of Shakespeare’s tragedy. She made her off-Broadway debut at fifteen when she played Dorothy in Oz: A Twisted Musical. Eleven years after she discovered her passion for acting, she would go on to play Lady Macbeth once again in London at the Globe Theatre, where she studied Shakespeare during her third year at Mason Gross School of the Arts. She received her BFA in acting from Rutgers University.
Ruffin Prentiss is a voice talent and audiobook narrator.
Megan Tusing is an actress, known for The Beginning and the End, The Share, and Odd Jobs. She has a bachelor’s degree in theatre from James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia.