Just Us Women

Caines, Jeannette.  (1982).  Just us women.  New York:  HarperCollins Publishers.

Jeannette Caines’ fiction children’s book, Just Us Women, is a Reading Rainbow Book and won the Coretta Scott King Honor Book for Illustration in 1982.  The main characters, Aunt Martha and her niece, take a road trip together to North Carolina.  On their trip they take fried chicken, bread, and cake in shoeboxes.  They stop at roadside markets and buy all of the junk they want.  They walk in the rain, talk to farmers and buy their fruits, take pictures in front of famous statues, eat at fancy restaurants, and have breakfast at night.  All of this they do as “just us women.”

I chose this book because it reminds me of the fun road trips I’ve been on with my girlfriends.  It is a realistic fiction story about an aunt and her niece enjoying themselves at roadside markets, fancy restaurants, and in the rain.  I would recommend this book to students because they can relate to it in different ways, whether they have been on a road trip themselves or have a special relationship with a family member.  The writing style is simplistic, intended for readers ages 4 to 8.  The realistic and mixed media illustrative technique Pat Cummings, the illustrator, used won the book the Coretta Scott King Honor Award.

Some BIG questions you could ask your students are, “If you could go on a road trip, who would you chose to go with you?  Why did you choose this person?  What are some things you would like to do on your road trip?”.