The Spare Room

The Spare Room is the diary of twelve-year-old Susannah Allen, who lives on her family's farm in 1843 Vermont. She chronicles her days at the Middleton one-room schoolhouse, her daily farm and household chores, and her circle of friends.Susannah begins to learn about slavery in the South and the Abolitionist movement in the North, but the issues soon become more than idle gossip. Her father hires Jacob, an escaped slave, to work as a farmhand and live in the Allen's spare room. When tensions explode in her town, Susannah must face how to stand up to prejudice when it's a matter of life or death. The Spare Room is a story appropriate to all readers, ages ten and up. Author Reeve Lindbergh said, “The Spare Room combines the atmosphere of Little House in the Big Woods with the ethical questions of To Kill a Mockingbird.” Author Howard Frank Mosher also noted that Land “writes with the magical touch of Laura Ingalls Wilder.”

Jenny Land was born in Vermont. After her education at Dartmouth College, the University of St. Andrews, and Oxford University, she returned to Vermont to teach English and creative writing at St. Johnsbury Academy, and to work on farms during the summer. She lives in Peacham, Vermont with her husband and twin daughters.