Journey Home ― Passage to Womanhood

Journey Home is the story of Tamara Woodson, who lives in the American West in the 1880s. She is smart and sassy, and has a mind of her own. Like many black families of that era following slavery, her family traveled west and founded their own town.

Tamara Woodson is at a turning point in her life. She begins a journey of self-discovery that reveals important connections to her ancestral past. Prompted by her ambitions and experiences, she prepares herself for an uncertain future.

At one point, Tamara’s fears are expressed in a dream that intertwines a Nigerian Yoruba folktale. She learns to interpret important symbols. At another, Tamara learns about the Apache Indian culture from a girl who is preparing for her own elaborate coming of age ceremony. Exposure to these two cultures helps Tamara validate the values and traditions of others as well as her own. As she matures, Tamara learns to let go of her own fears and to rely on her inner strength.

Journey Home is book one in the juvenile historical fiction series, “Passage to Womanhood.”

Toni Eubanks is originally from Detroit, Michigan where most of her coming of age experiences took place against the backdrop of the turbulent 1960s. After moving to New York in the 1980s, she began her work at Girl Scouts of the USA in program development. During her tenure, Eubanks developed a broad range of informal educational material for girls on self-esteem, values, health and fitness, and diversity. In 1999, she gained recognition for authoring the first official Girl Scout historical novel, Octavia’s Girl Scout Journey: Savannah 1916 (now out of print).
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Eubanks says that the crowning achievement of her work has been the opportunity to touch the lives of girls all over the United States, to empower them to think critically, to analyze problems and issues, and to assume leadership roles. Her interest in the healthy development of adolescent girls, along with her research on the coming of age experiences of young Americans throughout history, led Eubanks to create her own series of juvenile historical fiction, “Passage to Womanhood.” Her research has taken her to the American West of the 1880s, the Gullah culture of South Carolina, and African American roots in Nova Scotia.
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Eubanks has recorded her experiences in South Carolina in her essay, “A Sea Island Legacy,” published in the anthology of travel adventures, Go Girl! The Black Woman’s Book of Travel and Adventure. She has conducted workshops for the National Black Child Development Institute, Bank Street College Alumni Association in New York, the Arizona Genealogy Society, and schools and Girl Scout councils across the nation. She is a Finalist in the 2013 Harvest Book Reading’s Featured Book Competition in Phoenix, AZ.
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Eubanks lives with her husband in the desert community of Anthem, Arizona; and teaches at South Mountain Community College. Her four granddaughters, two sets of twins, are her greatest inspiration.
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