Sister was published by Thomas Y. Crowell in 1974 and is Greenfield’s first novel for middle-grade readers. Thirteen-year-old Doretha — called “Sister” by her family — reads through the diary she has kept since age nine, and the entries take the reader back through four years of family life: her father’s departure, her older sister Alberta’s increasingly self-destructive behavior, her mother’s quiet strength, and Doretha’s own development from a confused child into a young woman beginning to understand the complexity of the world.
The diary structure gives the novel a fragmented, non-linear quality that mirrors the way memory actually works: events are recalled out of order, important moments appear without fanfare, and the full significance of early entries only becomes clear later. Greenfield trusts her young readers to make these connections themselves, and the novel respects their intelligence without overwhelming them with adult complexity.
The portrait of a Black family under economic and emotional pressure — drawn without sentimentality or melodrama — was relatively rare in children’s literature in 1974, and the novel’s honesty about difficult subjects (abandonment, anger, the temptation of drugs) within a framework of love and resilience made it a groundbreaking work. Sister’s eventual recognition that she can choose her own path — that her father’s weakness and her sister’s rebellion do not determine her future — is earned through the accumulation of small moments rather than any dramatic revelation.
Collecting Sister
First edition (Thomas Y. Crowell, New York, 1974): Hardcover with dust jacket.
Market values:
- First edition in dust jacket: $30–$75
- Later printings: $5–$10