Dear America

Dear America
Series information
No. of books	43 (list of books)
Country	United States
Language	English
Publisher	Scholastic
Published from	September 1996 — October 2004 September 2010 — January 2014
Related series	My Name Is America The Royal Diaries My America

Dear America is a series of historical fiction novels published by Scholastic. The series began in 1996 with Kathryn Lasky's A Journey to the New World until the cancellation in 2004 after Hear My Sorrow. The series was relaunched in the fall of 2010, before ending around January 2014. A Journey to the New World and Hear My Sorrow were also the first and last books in the relaunch.

The series is told through a diary format with each book having a fictional female protagonist. There are a wide variety of topics, including war, immigration, and slavery, as well as well known historical events like the sinking of the Titanic and the Vietnam War. Nine of the books were adapted into short films from 1999 to 2000.

Scholastic released several spin-offs to Dear America, including My Name Is America in 1998, The Royal Diaries in 1999, and My America in 2000. The series also inspired many international equivalents, such as My Story, Dear Canada, My Australian Story, My New Zealand Story, and Mon Histoire.

Background and topics

Jean Feiwel, editor in chief of Scholastic at the time, created Dear America in 1996. Scholastic invited several authors to help launch the series, including Kristiana Gregory. Each book in Dear America is told through diary format and focuses on fictional female protagonists during various time periods in America. The time periods range from the landing at Plymouth Rock in 1620 to the Vietnam War in 1968. Other topics in the series include slavery, immigration, the American Revolution, several wars (including the American Civil War, World War I, and World War II), and the Great Depression. Hardcovers of the earlier books have a ribbon inserted to be used as bookmark, but are not included in later editions.

Dear America was relaunched in 2010 with a new look. Several of the original books were reissued, while new authors were brought on to write new books.

List of books

Publication order

Original

Cover	No.	Title	Author	Published	ISBN
	1	A Journey to the New World	Kathryn Lasky	September 1996	9780590502146
	2	The Winter of Red Snow	Kristiana Gregory	September 1996	9780439555074
	3	When Will This Cruel War Be Over?	Barry Denenberg	September 1996	9780439555173
	4	A Picture of Freedom	Patricia C. McKissack	March 1997	9780439555012
	5	Across the Wide and Lonesome Prairie	Kristiana Gregory	March 1997	9780590226516
	6	So Far from Home	Barry Denenberg	October 1997	9780439555067
	7	I Thought My Soul Would Rise and Fly	Joyce Hansen	October 1997	9780590849135
	8	West to a Land of Plenty	Jim Murphy	March 1998	9780590738880
	9	Dreams in the Golden Country	Kathryn Lasky	March 1998	9780439445634
	10	Standing in the Light	Mary Pope Osborne	September 1998	9780590134620
	11	Voyage on the Great Titanic	Ellen Emerson White	September 1998	9780590962736
	12	A Line in the Sand	Sherry Garland	September 1998	9780590394666
	13	My Heart Is on the Ground	Ann Rinaldi	April 1999	9780590149228
	14	The Great Railroad Race	Kristiana Gregory	April 1999	9780590109918
	15	The Girl Who Chased Away Sorrow	Ann Turner	September 1999	9780590972161
	16	A Light in the Storm	Karen Hesse	September 1999	9780590567336
	17	Color Me Dark	Patricia C. McKissack	April 2000	9780439529112
	18	A Coal Miner's Bride	Susan Campbell Bartoletti	July 2000	9780439445610
	19	My Secret War	Mary Pope Osbourne	September 2000	9780590687157
	20	One Eye Laughing, the Other Weeping	Barry Denenberg	October 2000	9780439095181
	21	Valley of the Moon	Sherry Garland	April 2001	9780606228107
	22	Seeds of Hope	Kristiana Gregory	June 2001	9780590511575
	23	Early Sunday Morning	Barry Denenberg	October 2001	9780439555135
	24	My Face to the Wind	Jim Murphy	October 2001	9780590438100
	25	Christmas After All	Kathryn Lasky	November 2001	9780439219433
	26	A Time for Courage	Kathryn Lasky	March 2002	9780590511414
	27	Where Have All the Flowers Gone?	Ellen Emerson White	June 2002	9780439148894
	28	Mirror, Mirror on the Wall	Barry Denenberg	September 2002	9780439194464
	29	Survival in the Storm	Katelan Janke	November 2002	9780439215992
	30	When Christmas Comes Again	Beth Seidel Levine	November 2002	9780439439824
	31	Land of the Buffalo Bones	Marion Dane Bauer	April 2003	9780439220279
	32	Love Thy Neighbor	Ann Turner	April 2003	9780439153089
	33	All the Stars in the Sky	Megan McDonald	September 2003	9780439169639
	34	Look to the Hills	Patricia C. McKissack	April 2004	9780439210386
	35	I Walk in Dread	Lisa Rowe Fraustino	October 2004	9780439249737
	36	Hear My Sorrow	Deborah Hopkinson	October 2004	9780439221610

Relaunch

Cover	No.	Title	Author	Published	ISBN
	1	A Journey to the New World	Kathryn Lasky	September 2010	9780545238014
	2	The Winter of Red Snow	Kristiana Gregory	September 2010	9780545238021
	3	The Fences Between Us	Kirby Larson	September 2010	9780545224185
	4	Voyage on the Great Titanic	Ellen Emerson White	November 2010	9780545238342
	5	A Picture of Freedom	Patricia C. McKissack	January 2011	9780545242530
	6	Like the Willow Tree	Lois Lowry	January 2011	9780545144698
	7	A Light in the Storm	Karen Hesse	March 2011	9780545242455
	8	When Will This Cruel War Be Over?	Barry Denenberg	April 2011	9780545275989
	9	Cannons at Dawn	Kristiana Gregory	May 2011	9780545213196
	10	Standing in the Light	Mary Pope Osborne	May 2011	9780545266871
	11	I Thought My Soul Would Rise and Fly	Joyce Hansen	July 2011	9780545266864
	12	With the Might of Angels	Andrea Davis Pinkney	September 2011	9780545297059
	13	I Walk in Dread	Lisa Rowe Fraustino	September 2011	9780545311656
	14	Behind the Masks	Susan Patron	January 2012	9780545304375
	15	Across the Wide and Lonesome Prairie	Kristiana Gregory	April 2012	9780545350662
	16	Christmas After All	Kathryn Lasky	September 2012	9780545381772
	17	Down the Rabbit Hole	Susan Campbell Bartoletti	March 2013	9780545297011
	18	A City Tossed and Broken	Judy Blundell	March 2013	9780545310222
	19	Hear My Sorrow	Deborah Hopkinson	January 2014	eBook only

Chronological order

See also: List of books by time period

No.	Title	Time period
1	A Journey to the New World	1620 – 1621
2	I Walk in Dread	1691 – 1692
3	Look to the Hills	1763
4	Standing in the Light	1763 – 1764
5	Love Thy Neighbor	1774 – 1775
6	The Winter of Red Snow	1777 – 1778
7	Cannons at Dawn	1779 – 1781
8	A Line in the Sand	1835 – 1836
9	Valley of the Moon	1845 – 1846
10	Across the Wide and Lonesome Prairie	1847
11	So Far from Home	1847
12	All the Stars in the Sky	1848
13	Seeds of Hope	1849
14	A Picture of Freedom	1859 – 1860
15	A Light in the Storm	1860 – 1861
16	When Will This Cruel War Be Over?	1863 – 1864
17	The Girl Who Chased Away Sorrow	1864 — 1865
18	I Thought My Soul Would Rise and Fly	1865 – 1866
19	The Great Railroad Race	1868 – 1869
20	Down the Rabbit Hole	1871
21	Land of the Buffalo Bones	1873 – 1874
22	My Heart Is on the Ground	1879 – 1880
23	Behind the Masks	1880
24	My Face to the Wind	1881 – 1882
25	West to a Land of Plenty	1883
26	A Coal Miner's Bride	1896 – 1897
27	Dreams in the Golden Country	1903 – 1905
28	A City Tossed and Broken	1906
29	Hear My Sorrow	1909 – 1911
30	Voyage on the Great Titanic	1912
31	A Time for Courage	1917
32	When Christmas Comes Again	1917 – 1919
33	Like the Willow Tree	1918 – 1919
34	Color Me Dark	1919
35	Mirror, Mirror on the Wall	1931 – 1932
36	Christmas After All	1932
37	Survival in the Storm	1935
38	One Eye Laughing, the Other Weeping	1938
39	My Secret War	1941 – 1942
40	Early Sunday Morning	1941
41	The Fences Between Us	1941 – 1943
42	With the Might of Angels	1954 – 1955
43	Where Have All the Flowers Gone?	1967 – 1968

Collections

Cover	No.	Title	Contains	Published	ISBN
	1	The Birth Of Our Nation	A Journey to the New World Standing in the Light The Winter of Red Snow The Journal of Jasper Jonathan Pierce	October 2002	9780439129381
	2	Heading West	Across the Wide and Lonesome Prairie The Great Railroad Race Seeds of Hope The Journal of Douglas Allen Deeds	October 2002	9780439129411
	3	Coming to America	So Far from Home A Coal Miner's Bride Dreams in the Golden Country The Journal of Otto Peltonen	October 2002	9780439129404
	4	Nation at War: The Civil War	When Will This Cruel War Be Over? A Light in the Storm The Journal of James Edmond Pease	October 2002	9780439129398
	5	Seasons of Bravery	I Thought My Soul Would Rise and Fly The Girl Who Chased Away Sorrow A Time for Courage The Journal of Biddy Owens	October 2002	9780439129428
	6	Nation at War: World War II	Early Sunday Morning My Secret War The Journal of Ben Uchida The Journal of Scott Pendleton Collins	October 2002	9780439129435

Related books

Cover	Title	Author	Published	ISBN
	Dear America Third Annual Student Writing Contest: The Winning Entries	Various	September 2000	0439249988
	Teaching with Dear America Books	Jeanette Sanderson	January 2001	9780439105477

Media

Television

Main article: Dear America (film series)

In 1999 and 2000, nine short films based on the Dear America series aired on HBO's Family Channel, along with three films based on The Royal Diaries. Some of the films were released on video cassette and are now available for purchase on streaming services.

Stage plays

A Light in the Storm, Dreams in the Golden Country, and Color Me Dark were adapted into stage plays from 2002 to 2005. Each play was performed at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts before going on tour. A script for Across the Wide and Lonesome Prairie was also produced.

Other

• Dear America: Friend to Friend: a 2000 PC game based on six books from the series.
• Madame Alexander Dear America Collection: a collection of four dolls released in 1999.

Website

Main article: Dear America: The Official Web Site

A website for Dear America was likely created sometime around its launch in 1996. It served primarily as a way to promote the series, its spin-offs, and other media. The website also encouraged a high level for fan interaction, which included the Dear America Writing Contest. Currently, the website is no longer accessible in its original or revamped forms. Scholastic still hosts a web page, "Teach Dear America," which is specifically for teachers.

Awards

• Jefferson Cup Award, Virginia Library Association (1996)

External links

• Teach Dear America at Scholastic
• Dear America Teaching Guide at Scholastic (archive)
• Dear America and My Name is America: A Thematic Discussion Guide (archive)
• Dear America on Wikipedia