[With Dicey's Song, Cynthia Voigt] proves that heroines of young adult fiction can be mature, considerate, even exemplary, and still seem quite real. Dicey Tillerman, the heroine of Dicey's Song, is not just good, she is strong, like a birch sapling, and it is Voigt's skill in convincing us of that strength that makes her seem so real. (p. 8)

Of course the journey [that began in Homecoming] isn't over once Gram's house has been reached. Dicey still must play the leader, making accommodation with a proud and independent grandmother (who reluctantly has to go on welfare to support them all), trying to help Sammy, Maybeth and James navigate successfully through a new world.

Dicey is a fulcrum for the characters balanced about her: zany Sammy who, at 8, is trying to be good, for a change; Maybeth, a musical prodigy who still can't quite read; James, bookish and serious...