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OLDER FICTION
Blankman, Anne

The Blackbird Girls

345 pp. | Viking | March, 2020 | Trade ISBN 978-1-9848-3735-6 $16.99
(2) YA This book trusts readers to figure out that protagonists Valentina and Oksana, whose perspectives alternate for most of the story, have been taught a lot of misinformation. The 1986 Chernobyl disaster forces the eleven-year-old classmates to flee Pripyat, Ukraine, and live in Leningrad with Valentina's kind and generous Babulya, the grandmother she has never known. Oksana has long bullied Valentina for being Jewish, and seeing the misconceptions she'd learned about Jews from her abusive father disproven is Oksana's first indication that he wasn't right about everything. Both girls, whose fathers worked at the Chernobyl nuclear plant, have believed the Soviet government's downplaying of the dangers of radiation, and the catastrophic consequences for their fathers come as a shock to them. Flashbacks to Valentina's grandmother's youth during the Holocaust give a third narrative perspective, shedding light on how Babulya came to be who she is, as well as on her clandestine, illegal religious practice. Though the events are largely bleak, Babulya is a source of hope for the young protagonists, whose gradual evolutions are believable and affecting. Back matter includes information and further reading about Chernobyl as well as resources for readers experiencing abuse.
Reviewer: Shoshana Flax | Horn Book Magazine Issue: March, 2020

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