The Scarlet Stockings Spy

Author: Trinka Hakes Noble
Illustrator: Robert Papp
Grade level: 3-5th
Awards: None

Summary:
Maddy Rose is a young girl who lives with only her mom as her father was killed during the Revolutionary War and her older brother Jonathon is fighting in Washington's army. She dreams of one day being a great seamstress like all the other women she knows. Her brother visits outside her window every night until one day a new figure appears after he hadn't shown in a few days. It is another soldier named Seth who says that he knew Johnathon and gave Maddy her dead brothers blue coat that he wore during battle. She takes the blue from his coat, white from her petticoats and her red stockings to sew an American flag that she will hang outside of her window. Years later this flag goes missing but can be identified as the top star is slightly larger than all the others and right below is a musket hole.

Evaluation:
This book was pretty choppy and did not flow as well as I would have liked it to; however, it is still a good book to read when in a social studies class discussing the American Revolution. I do really love the illustrations of this book as it is a very high quality picture book in which the illustrations tell just as much of the story as the words. The colors have a great contrast depending on the scene which helps set the tone in which the reader should be reading.