When fifteen-year-old Carl and his seventeen-year-old brother Adam are orphaned, they must move in 1922 to Portland, Oregon to live with their Uncle Pete. When Adam is falsely accused of stealing jewelry from the home of his wealthy girlfriend, Carl must confront anti-Catholic and anti-immigrant sentiment as he works to find the real thief.

Reviewed by Grandma Bev for TeensReadToo.com

THE CASE AGAINST MY BROTHER is a very well-written mystery with wonderful characters and a suspenseful plot featuring a backdrop of intolerance and bigotry in a little known dark corner of American history.

Fifteen-year-old Carl Matuski and his older brother, Adam, live in Portland, Oregon with an uncle since their mother passed away from lung disease. The boys are Polish Catholics and Portland is in the midst of the anti-immigrant campaign for the 1922 Oregon School Law, which sought to make Catholic schools in the state illegal. Now Adam has been accused of stealing jewelry from the wealthy family of his girlfriend, and Carl knows that his brother is innocent. He insists that Adam hide out until he can clear him of the charges.

The neighborhood police officer is very anti-Catholic and harbors prejudice against Polish immigrants, as well. He seems to be on the street nearly every time Carl ventures out, and corners him to ask questions concerning the whereabouts of Adam. Carl is frustrated by Adam's failure to hide out, and the fact that he always seems to want more money. Carl attends school and is working two part-time jobs to earn money to help Adam and to try to help out at home, too. The boys' uncle is a poor man who tries his best to do right by these nephews that he has inherited, but times are hard, and the current political situation makes life even more difficult. Somehow, Adam has changed, and Carl isn't sure what to do about that. He begins working extra hard to solve the mystery of the jewel robbery.

Carl makes friends with a newspaper reporter, and chases down clues about the robbery for the reporter to write about. He just wants to clear his brother's name so that they can both go back to Baltimore, but when Carl ends up in the wrong place at the wrong time and witnesses a murder, the action and the suspense shift into high gear, and the suspense builds to an exciting, unexpected conclusion.

Libby Sternberg is a master at characterization and plotting and this story will keep you reading straight through to the end. I would love to see more stories about Carl Matuski...what an exciting new character! ( )