Slap Your Sides

Everyone in Sweet Creek, Pennsylvania, knows about Jubal Shoemaker's brother Bud. Instead of going off to fight in World War II, Bud abides by his family's Quaker beliefs and becomes a conscientious objector. Suddenly a lot of folks in town are treating the Shoemakers differently, including someone who writes hostile messages across their store window. Fourteen-year-old Jubal, who has always wanted to be like his older brother, wonders if he can be—if he even *wants* to be like him—when Bud's decision is tearing their family apart.

A pioneer of modern young-adult fiction, M.E. Kerr delivers in her first historical novel a brilliantly insightful story about the wartime events that rock a small town.