New Boy

by Julian Houston

Fifteen-year-old Rob Garrett wants nothing more than to escape the segregated South and prove himself. But in late 1950s Virginia, opportunity doesn’t come easily to an African American. So Rob’s parents take the unusual step of enrolling their son in a Connecticut boarding school, where he will have the best education available. He will also be the first student of color in the school’s history. No matter—Rob Garrett is on his way.
   But times are changing. While Rob is experiencing the privilege and isolation of private school, a movement is rising back home. Men and women are organizing, demanding an end to segregation, and in Rob’s hometown, his friends are on the verge of taking action. There is even talk about sitting in at a lunch counter that refuses to serve black people. How can Rob hope to make a difference when he’s a world away?

Genres: Historical Fiction, Young Adult, Fiction, School, African American, Realistic Fiction, Historical

288 pages, Hardcover

First published November 28, 2005

About the author

Julian Houston was born in Richmond, Virginia, and educated in the public schools of that city before attending the Hotchkiss School in Lakeville, Connecticut. He attended Boston University and was a community organizer in Harlem during the civil rights movement. He is now an associate justice of the Superior Court of Massachusetts. Julian Houston lives in Brookline, Massachusetts, with his wife and family.

Reviews

[Melody · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gripping, true to life story of a young southern black boy who goes North to boarding school, sent by his parents to escape segregation. Well-written though there are a few spots where the grown judge drowns out the vulnerable boy. Very nicely done, overall.

[Rachael · Rating 2 out of 5]

In the book New Boy, by Julian Houston, a fifteen year old African American boy named Rob Garret is trapped in a world of segregation. Rob’s number one dream is to prove himself in this world of impossibilities for his race. Unfortunately, in the 1950’s, his homeland Virginia, does not offer him as much as he needs for success. Because Rob has extremely good grades compared to most of his classmates, his parents take the unusual step of sending him to the Draper Boarding School in Connecticut. For Rob, this change is huge especially because he is an African American, he knows nobody there, and nobody really wants to know him there. Determined to no end, Rob pulls himself through school receiving the honor role many times, and proving himself to the whites. He also takes part in a movement at home, rebelling against segregation in the south. Throughout this book, Julian Houston conveys the theme message that if you keep your head up, and believe in what you know is right, you may have better respect from others, and a much better outcome overall. I personally liked this book because the storyline is unique.

[Peyton · Rating 2 out of 5]

it was okay. very anticlimatic. i had to read it for school. was boring.

[Soham · Rating 1 out of 5]

The genre of prejudice in the American 50s is an old one, but every once in a while a book comes to take that genre and completely reinvent it. That book should feature a strong protagonist, a good cast of supporting characters, and entertaining byplay between the characters. Unfortunately, New Boy by Julian Houston does not manage any of these. New Boy is about a young black boy named Rob Garrett who is the first African American to attend a prestigious Connecticut boarding school. The reader might expect him to receive racist abuse from his classmates, but he is largely unscathed. However, his best friend, an acne-covered, Jewish boy named Vinnie, receives much abuse from his fellow students. The story also follows Rob’s journeys home and his time spent arranging protestations against racism. Rob’s story fails to impress as he seems to be a bit detached and robotic, and the supporting characters appear one-dimensional at most.
Rob Garrett is the epitome of a model student. Julian Houston tries to stress that throughout the book. He has Rob continuously turn down time to socialize in order to study. A major part of the beginning of the book was Rob wondering whether he would be accepted by the other students in his school, and by large he is. However it is quite strange, that a kid who is already so different from the other superficially, is also mentally different from the majority.
Another problem with the book is the poor and rather boring interplay between the characters. While I can understand Rob not talking to his classmates because he is black and the others are white, it makes no sense for Rob to seem so guarded when he is at home. Even when he is talking to his friend Russell, or to his girlfriend, Paulette, Rob talks like a computer. The reader cannot pick out any emotion from his voice. While it may be that Rob is a guarded person, that is still no excuse for him not to talk to anyone at length, or at the very least struggle inwardly with his emotions.
Finally, one of the most fundamental problems in this book is that the characters are boring. Houston seems to have put some of the characters in the book, just to fill out the pages. For example, the character of Sylvia is a complete waste of time. She does nothing remotely interesting nor something productive in the book. She could have been an important character, a major part of the sit-in movement, but instead she is background noise which one can easily tune out. Also, the character of Mr. McGregor could have been used as a father figure, a bad teacher or just a friend of Rob. Instead he gets stuck as a person who can’t seem to figure out what to do: help or hinder.
All in all, the book New Boy by Julian Houston, fails to impress. It suffers from underdeveloped characters, boring dialogue, and an annoying protagonist. However, the book does have intriguing ideas driving it, but unfortunately, somebody forgot to install the brakes for this particular car. Ideas came roaring out into it, but the beat up husk of a car that is New Boy crashed right into a wall.

[ØrionSof2014 · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought this book was pretty interesting. This book is about a kid named Rob and his struggle with going to a boarding school in Connecticut. Rob is african american and most of the kids that go to school there are white. It is really hard to go to the school because if Rob makes one bad move all eyes will be on him. This book is really good and it sounds like its non fiction.
I can make a text to world connection to this book. Rob and hundreds of people have done the same thing. Rob needed a better education and he couldn't find it is Virginia. For lots of kids it is very hard to go to a school where you feel like all eyes are on you. Lots of people gave up and didn't get a good education but Rob doesn't give up, he tries and tries and he gets what he wants.
I would rate this book five start. I cant say anything bad about this book. It was interesting, at some points scary and at other time funny. I loved this book. This book was very inspiring for me. I would recommend this book to a person who loves great stories and stories about people who did amazing things.

[Mateo · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is about a black kid, Rob, that just moved to Virginia. He faced racism before but now it might be like never before. He attends to an all boy, all white school. He makes friends there and then he hears that there is a protest against racism. He wants to attend to the protest but he doesn't know what the consequences would be. If he goes to the protest he could go to jail and his friends might doubt him, and if he doesn't he will have to leave his family dumbfounded.
The connection I made is that people really want to speak out with problems they have, but they don't know what might happen. They do think before they act, but the problems weren't what they thought it would.
I gave this book 4 stars because it was really gripping and you wanted to figure out what would happen and what Rob would do. This book was hard to understand at times because i couldn't understand what was going on at times but it was a very good book. I recommend this to anyone that has/will be in a protest of some sort and doesn't know what might happen.

[Prathosh · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book talks about segregation in the 1950s during the civil rights movement. Rob Garrett is the first colored boy in Draper High. Rob talks about his daily life, and about his friends. It is pretty fun to read, and it is a good source for segregation in the south and how they treated blacks in the north.

It is picking up really well. It talks more about segregation in the south and the rules applied to southerners. Now, Rob has 2 friends, one of his friends is Vinnie. Vinnie is getting harrassed by the other guys in his dormitory. The other friend is Gordie Burns. He is a good friend, and he does not treat Rob based upon his race.

This book talks about a daily life of a black who is the first to attend an all-white school. This book was really interesting for me to read. I think that it will be interesting to read as it did for me to others.

[AC]

The character seems more like a vessel for historical information than an actual boy living through the time. While I think this book certainly serves a purpose, it was not an overly enjoyable reading experience for me.

[Erin]

New Boy: Julian Houston
Segregation was always seen towards blacks and whites but the real group of people that were being segregated against was anyone who was different from being white. New Boy is a realistic fiction written by Julian Houston about a young sophomore from Virginia who is the first black kid at an all-boys boarding school in Connecticut. This young man by the name of Rob Garrett is very adventurous with his learning and always wants to learn something new. While at this boarding school he experiences segregation within the white race towards one of his new friends. He sees this as something new because segregation always occurred towards black people and not whites, but something about this kid was different. Rob’s new friend was not from the U.S, he was Italian, had read hair, and had freckles. Because of this the other kids at the school saw him as different even though he was white.
While reading New Boy I learned a lot of new things about how people were treated back then and how the South was different from the North. I learned how the North wasn’t segregated but some people still wanted it to be. This book gave examples of real-life events that occurred around the time that this book took place. One of the main examples that the author put in this book to help give a better background was what happened to Emmett Till. Emmett Till was a young boy who was viciously murdered because he was catcalling a white woman. Emmett's story is one of the many heartbreaking stories that took place back in the day and I liked that the author included it in the book. The text within this book was extremely effective when talking about segregation because of how the dialogue was portrayed. The day before Rob was supposed to travel back to his home he ate lunch with his new friend Burns. While at the table a conversation was going on about Woodrow Wilson and how he was a great president. Rob overheard this conversation and said, “Wilson was a segregationist.” In this moment the author showed how Rob wasn’t scared to speak his mind in front of the white kids and was now beginning to stand up for what was right.
Topics like segregation and racism tend to anger me and those were big topics throughout this book. Reading this book did make me feel upset that not only colored people, but even people who are white were not treated fairly, but it was nice to learn about the other sides of the story. Overall this was a great book and I love how I was able to relate to the main character because he lived in Virginia and he was a sophomore just like me. I do recommend this book to other high school students especially during black history month because this was a nice read during the month of February. Reading this book was very educational, but this book was definitely directed to a younger audience because of how Rob was in high school. Once again, New Boy was an amazing book and I was always on the edge of my seat.

[Benji · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book New Boy is a historical fiction book written by Julian Houston. The main character Rob Garrett who lives in Virginia in the 1950s is a African American which means he is not accepted much there. So his parents decide to have him do a boarding school in Connecticut to make sure he gets a good education. One problem of course is he is the first ever black kid in this school and at the same time back in Virginia rios on separation laws are going on. Even so, in one of the lunch counters in his school, there is a lunch counter that refuses to serve blacks. Story aside, this is a book targeted towards more hardcore readers. One example is in word choices, some words include N*gros (might be swearing) biblical, bulge, and midst. The second example is swearing there is way too much of it in my opinion. WARNING Swear words incoming 1 letter will be censored in each word. These include motherf*cker, sh*t, and of course, ni uhhh the N word! “ Well I never boy, what in the world do you think you doin? You are getting out of the line N word” (137) (It was said in full not like the N word) While I understand that it's definitely Ok for 13 year olds to hear these words, it is used way too much and it feels like it was made for 15 year olds just like Rob! While New Boy is nothing bad it is definitely one that is best left for 10/11th graders.

[jaded doe · Rating 4 out of 5]

i thought it was amazing. it had such good, vivid, scenes! it's one of the rare books that makes me feel like i'm really there. rob is a really good character who does good but also has flaws. i also really liked that rob is a part of a powerful movement, but, the thrilling outcome rob wants doesn't come quickly or easily. it's a good, quick, read and i reccomend it a lot! the only thing i would warn people about is the use of cursing and the use of the n-word, a lot. and, the only reason i put it at a 4 is because some parts of the book were hard to follow because they're written very passively, like the time in between school breaks or rob coming home.

[Ashley Rodgers · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was very interesting because it shows the levels of segregation and racism that existed. Rob is new to an all white school and he is the only black person there. Rob quickly makes friends and realizes that not only black people were segregated against. Rob's friend is made fun of by the other students to the point where a bathroom and sink are labeled specifically for him because no one wants to use the same facilities as him. This book gives insight into the life as an only black person at a school during the time of segregation and racism.

[Maddox D.]

This book was very interesting to me. The author had a very fast paced writing style that really suited the way the story played out. This book has a very important purpose and teaches us what the black people of the 1950's had to deal with, (Specifically racism and segregation) But rather than any non-fiction book, this story is written in the perspective of a very smart black male who gos to a school that only (So far) white people have attended. Overall, it was a very nice story, and although sad, it was very informative of the past problems the the U.S. has had with segregation.

[Thomás Barbosa · Rating 3 out of 5]

New boy is about a boy who has been in many schools before and always gets good grades. His name is Rob and now he is again moving to a new school and this school is an all white school that has never received a black before he is going to this school to receive the best education and escape segregation. When he arrives at the school he meets Vinne, his first friend during the school year he just tries to pass by with good grades and with happiness. By the end of the year he is able to find happiness but his friend Vinee does not.

[JL Salty · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read history for specifics re:profanities.
I’m not sure this is a good book for rising 7th graders at our school. Rob behaves in a manner much older than his sophomore year in hs - I feel like the author wanted to write a ya novel, but the main historical characters were college age, so the thoughts and attitudes needed to be college level, but the characters needed to be younger. Maybe a different time? Not sure.
Rating: pg-13 for language, mature logic, thinking, actions.
Recommend: rising hs and up

[Jack Richards · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very good book, the story is very detailed and is filled with information about life as an African American during the period of segregation. It has a lot of interesting scenes and is a very fun book to read. It is very cool how the author shows the reader what it is like to be the only African American student at a school in Connecticut, it is also cool how the author shows what is different between an African American living in the north and then living in the south.

[Jacey Fox · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think overall it was a great book. the characters were well developed and the plot had a lot of meaning. Also, the way the author follows Rob is very good and I like that it is in 1st person. Would highly recommend it to anybody that likes character-driven books and hisrtory. Would not recommend it if you like action-packed stories.

[Walter · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is my first choice book. I really liked the book, you can really tell what it was like back then, and how unbalanced that it was. Basically, the main character Rob, was a black 15 year old from Virginia. Rob is very smart and had the chance to go to a boarding school in in the state of Connecticut called Draper. Rob was the first black student in the school's 87 year history! At Draper, Rob only makes 2 true friends. Rob goes back to Virginia for a boycott to protest segregation. On the second day of the protest, a bunch of people riot the boycott. But Rob made a mark in trying to end segregation.

[Samarth Khandelwal · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book was pretty okay. It had some strong points and some weak. Sometimes the language was robotic and it got boring very quickly. It had a good message, but it was trying way too hard to tell that to the reader and it made the book stray from realistic fiction to unrealistic fiction.

[711Shayna · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought this book was very good. It definitely taught me a lot about what it was like for black people when the civil rights movement was just starting. It wasn't my favorite. It was not as good as some books I've read, but I still really liked it.

[Anthony · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found the book to have an interesting perspective. The narrative gave a small slice of an important moment in American history, and avoided the sweeping stories of other books to provide a unique glance of a more intimate vantage point of Civil Rights.

[Sleo Sleo · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was very disappointing. When Mr. Grabill forced me to read this, I could already tell it was going to be be bad. The character turned out to be very flat. The ending was trash and very confusing and leads readers confused.

[Christa Torrens · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting topic, but dry and lifeless prose. Much more 'telling' than 'showing' made this dull reading, no matter how engaging and relevant the topic.

[Box · Rating 1 out of 5]

Had to read it for school, it was a boring mess for me. Read it if you want but I didnt enjoy it at all

[Gianetta Major · Rating 3 out of 5]

very interesting story about race and what itcan do even at school and espicaly in the 1960's

[Nathan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was Great I loved the book and finished it in a day it was so good.

[Caleb · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is flat in the beginning but it gets better over time. the book is well planed and organized.
this book is not for elementary school kids.

[Diane · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting that it was written by a Superior Court Justice who went to Hotchkiss.

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

New Boy
By: Julian Houston
Published in 2005
Historical Fiction

“New Boy” by Julian Houston is a fantastic book about a boy named Rob Garrett, who’s life is anything but normal. He is the first and only African American at Draper Boarding School in Connecticut. While his friends and family are in Virginia, he s trying to fit in the best he can with all of the others. In the late 1950s the United States was a time of segregation and discrimination for African Americans. When he hears about people taking a stand down in Virginia, he desperately wants to go and help, but he is so far from them. With everything on the line, he must find a way to help his friends stand up for what is right.

“New Boy” really can teach you to a lot about standing up for what you believe in. When making a change, you have to know there is no way it’ll ever be easy, but you have to remember that it will get better in the long run. If you follow your goals and really believe that you can accomplish them, you will. Even the little things can make the difference, and you can’t give up right away. That is the inspiring message I got from this book.

I loved this book. Though I would have to recommend this book to people who really like historical fiction, which i certainly do. Julian Houston really captured the opinion of the victims of segregation and discrimination. It was like you felt the situation from the African Americans point of view. I’m glad that the United States has gotten past that, and all people of all different races and nationalities can live together in peace.

“I keep thinking I should leave. I’m the only colored student in the whole school. They never had one of us before.” Page 199.

Rob Garrett really feels alone at Draper. He only made a couple friends, and he spends most of his time working on his homework and studies. He is a win with his teachers, but not so much with his classmates. He has a tough year ahead of him, but he is determined to get past that and stay on Honor Roll like he has been since middle school.

I really liked this book, we were all new at one point and we’ve all felt alone. I really dislike change, unless it is for what is right. That is definitely some thing Rob and I have in common. I always try my best at everything, but sometimes, it isn’t always good enough. Even though that is bound to happen sooner or later, I have to push harder and go above and beyond what I believed was good enough in life. “New Boy” by Julian Houston was a phenomenal book that took low points in the past, and made into a lesson for the future.


Report by: Rachel Lamorgese

[Seth · Rating 3 out of 5]

New Boy, by Julian Houston, covers familiar territory in young adult fiction, and with good reason. The 1960's were a tumultuous time in U.S. history. The struggle to end segregation was a long battle. The Civil Rights movement was a conglomeration of many individual, momentous events, and despite Houston's uneven story telling, his inclusion of some of the most important people and protests of the era make the book worth reading.
New Boy focuses on these events at the expense of strong character building. Houston's efforts to include a wide array of characters also means limited appearances from all of the supporting cast. Protagonist Rob Garrett is fleshed out well. He's a thoughtful, intelligent freshman in high school who feels the weight of an entire race as attempts to make a positive impression as the first African-American student to enroll in his all-white Connecticut boarding school. Early in the novel we're introduced to Vinny, an Italian-American who faces discrimination because of his own heritage. Rob's Jewish friend Burns is also teased for his religion. The inclusion of these characters allows Houston to make his point that other ethnicities faced discrimination, and his point was well made; however, Vinny seemed to disappear, and, while Burns featured in my personal favorite scene at a jazz club in New York, his character remains mostly a mystery.
Aside from the lack of character development, the novel only suffered from an uneven plot. Garrett and Burns' clandestine trip into Harlem to see Coleman Hawkins let to a run in with Malcolm X and a few of his supporters. This was one of the most exciting scenes in the novel, and it was a turning point for Rob which would lead him towards making a stand against discrimination later on. But in between these moments there was a whole lot of eating and sleeping. He does gain a love interest, for those interested in that.
Despite these flaws, this is a very strong young adult novel. Houston remains true to the ideals of the period. He may even idealize the Garrett family. But the dialog between characters is mostly believable. The tense scenes evoke a range of emotions, from disgust to happiness. And best of all, he conveys just how exciting, and frightening, the time was.
From a teacher's perspective, this book has great tie-ins to the history of the '60s, it's exciting enough for students to enjoy it, and the language remains PG-13. (2 F-Bombs. I counted.) It may be too intense to teach in a middle school classroom, but it works well as recommended reading. And high school teachers should be able to fit this into the curriculum without issue.