Accurate plot summary of Ann Rinaldi's "In My Father's House" plzzz?

Question

PLZZZZZZ?

Answer 1

I just posted this review on my blog a week ago...
http://blbooks.blogspot.com/

Essentially the book is about one girl's journey from being someone who believes in the 'old South' to someone who believes in the 'new South'--a South without slaves that is revitalized with newer, progressive ideas. It is a family drama. At the beginning of the book, their mom is a widow who is getting married. The narrator is the middle child and the one who can't quite like this new guy coming into their lives. So there is a power struggle through most of the book. Your typical stepfather-stepchildren arguments. Her other conflicts are with one slave in particular who she feels is using witchcraft. And there is a conflict with a new governess/tutor her stepfather hired. So for the first half of the book, she's having a hard time getting along with practically everyone. She doesn't want to have to obey her new stepfather. She doesn't want to have to listen to her abolitionist teacher. She's very stubborn. Very strong-willed. The second half of the book she begins to mature. About 1860 or 1861 with all the talk of war, she's really growing up to what war would mean. She begins to agree with her father that the South is a lost cause. She does fall in love with a confederate soldier but he is married. So it can't go anywhere really. But her feelings and her long talks with this soldier only persuade her more of the pointlessness of war. As the first battle draws near, the family--at least the wife and children and most of the slaves--are sent away to a safer place. He buys another place--I can't remember the city or state offhand--but they become settled in. She falls in love with another Confederate soldier. Her father becomes a blockade runner I believe. Anyway, he's a speculator. He's making money from the war and saving it to provide for his family later on once the war is lost. Then the family moves again this time to Appomatox. Her stepfather is completely disillusioned. He hates war. He hates politics. He's angry and bitter. But somehow he ends up offering his house to the army when it comes time for the surrender to occur.

It's a good book but the pacing is odd. It starts in 1852 and continues through 1865. So one chapter might contain summaries for three or five years of family life...or even longer. And it was like watching this family on fast forward.

In My Father's House
Rinaldi, Ann. 1993. In My Father’s House.

IN MY FATHER’S HOUSE is an interesting historical novel based on actual historical events. Did you know that the land where the first battle of the Civil War took place was owned by the same man whose land provided the place for the signing of the Confederates’ surrender? Yes, the Civil War began on Will McLean’s property and ended on his property. Will McLean was a man who saw the collapse of the South years before the first battle of the Civil War took place. Considering himself a man of the New South, he raised his family to be more open-minded towards life. He even hired a Yankee governess for his children to tutor them. Oscie is Will McLean’s stepdaughter. Her father died when she was a young child--five or six--and Daddy Will has been the one to raise her for better or worse. Oscie is our young narrator. She provides a behind-the-scenes look at life on a plantation from 1852 to the close of the Civil War in 1865. As she grows up, she learns many life lessons--about life, love, family, and duty. She has difficulty at first deciding what exactly she believes and who she supports. Yet, as the civil war begins--she realizes as does her stepfather--that the Confederate cause is not only ill fated or doomed but that it deserves to be defeated so that something better can begin. Not an easy position to take when most of your neighbors would violently oppose your opinions if you aired them. But sometimes the right road isn’t always the easiest.

Answer 2

Ann Rinaldi

Answer 3

I like little johnny that surprisingly is the name for a lot of young kids in jokes

Answer 4

use sparknotes or cliffsnotes