Al Capone Does My Shirts, by Gennifer Choldenko
Al Capone Does My Shirts was chosen as a Newbery Honor Book in 2005, and also won many other awards. The author, Gennifer Choldenko, was especially pleased to win the Schneider Family Book Award which honors “a book that embodies an artistic expression of the disability experience for child and adolescent audiences” according to the website of the American Library Association.
Written for children, but loved by adults as well, this novel is set in one of the oddest and most fascinating places in the world: Alcatraz, the island home of what used to be a maximum security prison from 1934 to 1963. At that time, prisoners were not the only ones living on Alcatraz. When the story takes place, in the late 1930’s, many prison guards and other employees lived in apartments there with their families. The warden had a house.
In Choldenko’s novel, Moose, age 12, is forced to move to Alcatraz by his parents, but has a hard time adjusting to life away from his best friend in Santa Monica. There are other children on the island, but none he connects with right away. The warden’s daughter, Piper, is a trouble maker he tries to ignore, unsuccessfully. When Moose goes to school in San Francisco and meets Scout, he has a chance to play baseball with other boys. Then his mother ruins his fun by insisting that he go home from school immediately after school every day to take care of his older sister, Natalie, who is autistic.
Choldenko chose an unusual and exciting location for the novel, and it plays as important a role as any of her characters. According to an interview posted on her website, she got the idea for the novel from a newspaper article, then volunteered as a docent on Alcatraz to do her research. At the end of the novel she includes a few pages about Alcatraz history, noting what was historically accurate in her novel, and what parts were pure fiction.
Another element of the novel that contributed to its success was Natalie’s character - an autistic teenage girl who doubled as a human calculator while being totally out of touch with any part of reality other than her button collection and numbers. This character, while being wholly fictional, was based on Choldenko’s observation of her own older autistic sister. Moose’s predicament gives a voice to anyone who has been a caretaker of an autistic relative.
The novel’s bright red cover and a photograph of Alcatraz are essential to the appeal of the book. Now that it has a shiny silver Newbery Honor Book sticker as well, Al Capone Does My Shirts is sure to attract attention for years to come.





this book sounds really cool I would love to read it.
Comment by tom turner — July 2, 2008 @ 10:00 am
This book is great i loved it i would have never picked it up but i had to do it for a book report and it say boring at the beginning and it gets much better it is really. If u have never been to alcatraz it wont make ay sence. hope u love it 2
Comment by Gigi — September 27, 2008 @ 8:10 pm
this is the best book i have ever read in a long time i loved it so much and i dont really like to read and this book i did it didnot boor me at all like most books do so i went on vecation and i read every morining for a 2 weeks straight like with a normal boiring book i would not have done that but this book i did
keep doing what you are doing your doing great
Comment by Ashley — January 11, 2009 @ 7:55 am
I’m sorry but i do not agree with the comment above, saying “If you’ve never been to Alcatraz, then the book wont make any sense”. This is not true. I also had to read the book as a book report and enjoyed the book, i have never been to Alcatraz before and i completely understood the book. You DON’T have to have been to Alcatraz to look this book, its a best-seller!
Comment by leia — February 17, 2009 @ 3:17 am
I love the book so much.My reading teacher is made me read this book and I’m glad I was able to read it.Now we are doing an author report and I picked you because you write so many great books my favorite of yours was this one.It was a great book to read and I’m making my friends read it to.
Comment by Mackenzie — May 14, 2009 @ 4:36 pm