characters – Page 2 – Peaceful Reader

December reading

Ah December. I’m almost done Christmas shopping-YES! I’m in the process of decorating; the tree is up but not one ornament hangs on it yet. I’m crazy with homework; this Google advanced class is far more work than I expected. I am learning a lot so that does make it worth it.

With all the homework I’ve still managed to read two books so far this month and both were “thrillers”. I think I have to move away from this genre though for bedtime reading. One of the books gave me pre-sleep jitters…I got so involved with the characters and would continue to think about the situation while I trying to go to sleep.

Before the Fall by Noah Hawley (2016); This is the one. Something about Scott’s character appealed to me because he was someone who was flawed and admitted it. The first scenes of him in the water with the young boy as they attempt to swim to shore were agonizing for me and I had to keep reading even though it should have been time to put the book down and get some sleep. Each section was a little like that. I appreciated Scott’s philosophy throughout the book and felt attuned to the message that we all have a purpose here. So many interesting characters held together by an excited story line and the political commentary fits so well with what we are experiencing now! Chapters are done in alternating POV so you get to hear and understand from a variety of characters.

Zero Day by Jan Gangsei (2016); I picked this out one afternoon with Groovy Girl at our local library. We were there on a mission to find some good books for her to read, not an easy feat, as she is a picky non-reader. Also she has an English teacher right now who is taking the joy out of the written word. But I digress.

Zero Day takes place in Washington DC and Virginia and is focused on the political scene. Addie Webster, the then Virginia governor’s 9-year-old daughter, is kidnapped one day right out of the governor’s mansion. Eight years later she resurfaces. Her DNA checks out and she is reunited with her family in the White House. It’s not an easy transition and it is difficult for Addie to realize that her family moved on even without her. Her kidnapper still has a hold on her though and so while she attempts to fit back into her family she also has to do some weird undercover assignments for her “father/kidnapper” who is the head of an international terrorist group. I like both Jan’s writing style and the main idea but it all got a little far-fetched for me.

August is here…(I wasn't really ready)

July was not a good blogging month for me. We were out of town for a long week, preparations for that trip, it just seemed like a short month with not a lot of free time. We were also in a whirl over my husband’s production of Singin’ in the rain. Let’s just say it ain’t easy making it rain on stage! The play was fantastic and I’m glad it is over.

August, Oh August please be different. I need more days of reading in my lovely orange hammock. More days hanging with my soon-to-start-9th grade student. I need a few more pool days and hanging with friends days…

I did do a lot of reading in July. Vacation helped. Plus I participated in my first ever readathon-#24in48 sponsored by @Litsy. Just by chance I had that weekend free of children and husband so I literally sat around the house and read.

My July books:

The 5th Wave by Rick Yancy (2013): Great. Total sci-fi, aliens, and a large space ship. Kept me totally enthralled and a little freaked out.

Mr. Lemoncello’s Library Olympics by Chris Grabenstein (2016): So totally fun! I want to figure a way to make a library olympics to start off the new school year. The second book to Mr. Lemoncello’s Library, a series filled with the love of reading.

The Terrible Two by Mac Barnett (2015): Great school humor. Pranksters at the elementary level as only Mac Barnett could create. Loved the two character Miles and Niles! Perfect for 8-12-year-old jokesters, pranksters, or anyone with a funny bone.

One Second After by William R. Forstchen (2009): July book club choice. Very interesting look at how we would handle a major crisis in the US. Centered on Black Mountain and Asheville, NC which was cool because I was right there while reading it. I didn’t agree with his one-sided military viewpoint but definitely lots to think about.

A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara (2015): AMAZING. You will feel many emotions as your read this 720 page book. I wrote more about it here. Cannot get Jude or Willem out of my mind. I want everyone I know to read this so I can discuss it with them.

Stella by Starlight by Sharon M. Draper (2015): Good basic story about Stella’s father standing up for his right to vote and how the Klan doesn’t appreciate that kind of thing. I liked the story but was unhappy with the ending. Too quick with no resolution; just another day.

New Kid by Tim Green (2014): This was suspensful but like Stella left me wanting for a much better ending. This kid should have stayed with his coach and stopped running with his dad.

Wolf Hollow by Lauren Wolk (2016): Recently at Dragonfly Books in Decorah the owner talked me into buying this one. She simple said “It’s the best book I’ve read this year.” I thought so too. A simple yet complex story that shows how our prejudice often gets the better of some of us. Timely for today as well. I feel like this is a book I could read again.

I read a lot of elementary fiction this month. I’m trying to make it down my list of titles for Iowa Children’s Choice Award choices for next year so I will be ready to vote. If I added the book cover-it’s one you should pick up and read. Enjoy!

The brilliant David Rhodes

David Rhodes (2013)

Sometimes you read the written word and you just get a lovely chill up your spine, a chill of delight. For last month’s book club we read David Rhodes for the second time and I was again overwhelmed with his ability to create sentences, paragraphs, and chapters into such beauty. After reading two of his books I’m now counting myself to be somewhat of an expert. I have a just a few quotes here to share to entice you to read him as well.

“Nate was rubbing the back of his neck when his Breakfast Pie arrived in a deep blue ceramic dish. Curling blades of steam rose from cracks in the top. He poked his fork in, pried open a piece of crust and released and eruption of scalding air. …Freeing a small piece from the dish, he held it in midair, watched steam curl around the fork, and slid it between his teeth. Anticipating the heat, he didn’t close his lower jaw until this tongue informed him of an acceptable temperature. The taste moved into the corners of his mouth and his feature-detectors identified separate flavors; the crust, as he suspected was mostly seasoned bread crumbs and mild white cheddar; the mashed potato base held vegetable and ham, the binding savor owing most of its character to marjoram and thyme.” (7)

Beneath the dock, lazy liquid slapped against oak posts, and water bugs skittered madly in and out of rolling shadows. The hoarse croaking of a bullfrog sounded like an ancient door pried open, thick ribbons of iridescent green slime grew underwater, and the smell of moist heat, earth, and damp wood rose into the air. These sensations dove to the bottom of Kevin’s mind, where they were set to work in the mines of his young imagination.” (24)

“The giant silver maple at the top of the hill had a trunk nearly as wide as a garage door. He looked up into it and saw massive limbs flowing, outward and upward, supporting an array of branches and stems and a plantation of leaves that quivered audibly in the breeze. The undersides of the leaves, lighter in color, glittered when the leaves moved.

It was twenty degrees cooler here in the shade, and Nate immediately felt his body relaxing. He sat down and leaned against the trunk, then looked out across the ocean of cornrows below. On and on the green plants grew, pulling nutrients from the ground and turning them into corn.

The darkness that had afflicted him earlier evaporated.” (81)

“The morning, however, had an altogether different story to tell. After washing in cold water, dressing, making coffee, and carrying a steaming cup of it outside to drink, his surroundings unfolded before him a a way Blake had never experienced before. The preying vacancy of the night before had been replaced by the silent marvel of dew and plant life shaking off sleep, regrowing the world. A new sun rose in the east, and the beads of moisture hanging from the spokes of his motorcycle burned like blue diamonds. A chorus of wild fledglings sang about the significance of eating weed seeds, having feathers, and flying wherever they wanted. The air felt alive, and he participated in its vitality with every breath.” (233)

Rhodes has an affection for the wild, a connection to nature and good food. His descriptions simply amaze me and his characters are interestingly flawed.

We read his book Driftless last year as well and this continues many of the same characters and plunges them into another story. If you are in need of a good book look no further than Driftless and Jewelweed.

Found this in my draft box and it's too good not to still share: National Book Award Finalist; Louise Erdrich

I ordered this book for my mom for Christmas (hello, mom) and while it sat on my present shelf it spoke to me. “Read me” it said as I would pass by the shelf several times a day. So I did. I pulled it down and started to read. The fact that I finished it all has to do with how good the story was. While I read the book I posted several times how much I was enjoying the book and my mom kept texting me “I want that book!” I couldn’t say to her “I know you want that book; that’s why I got it for you for Christmas!” but I am saying that now in my blog post as the book is now wrapped in pretty green paper and on its way to you. Merry Christmas Mama. I previewed the book for you and yes, it is a wonderful story.

The Round House

Louise Erdrich

2012

317 pages

Synopsis

One Sunday in the spring of 1988, a woman living on a reservation in North Dakota is attacked. The details of the crime are slow to surface as Geraldine Coutts is traumatized and reluctant to relive or reveal what happened, either to the police or to her husband, Bazil, and thirteen-year-old son, Joe. In one day, Joe’s life is irrevocably transformed. He tries to heal his mother, but she will not leave her bed and slips into an abyss of solitude. Increasingly alone, Joe finds himself thrust prematurely into an adult world for which he is ill prepared.

The story is told from Joe’s point-of-view which makes it so much more heart-felt. Within the first few chapters Joe’s mom changes from the happy mom, ready with dinner, holding the family together kind of mother. The kind of mother most of us can relate to and then quickly she is the opposite of that as she lays crumpled in her bed unable to recover from the attack.

This story gives the reader an inside look at life on a reservation; the daily ins and outs as well as the way tribal law works. Bazil torments Geraldine with questions of where, where, where did the attack occur even as she is unable to talk about any of it to her family. His sole purpose is to decipher if the attacker can be prosecuted. He wants to know so he can solve the crime and she can’t tell as she does not want to relive even one second of that moment.

Joe tries to help with his mother, by tending to her, but she slaps him once as he tries to wake her and that moment he is scared for what the future holds for his family. Joe shifts his attention to trying to stay out of the house, away from his mother. Filled with great minor characters, like Sonja, his white aunt, all trying to help Joe in one way or another. The story shares a few jagged twists that eventually feed us and Joe back to his mother. There is hope that their family will prevail.

From a female perspective this story tells a crushing tale of male dominance in our society as a whole. Erdrich’s story shows us how a native woman has even less of a chance for salvation through the courts as Geraldine’s attacker was aware of the complexity of tribal law. Salvation must come through by other means then and that in itself is its own difficult journey as Joe shares with us.

My strong empathetic feeling toward native tribes and the terrible way in which Europeans and then Americans have punished this indigenous group was newly shocked as I learned through Erdrich’s details. Just as books that relay tales of slavery and civil rights help us to understand life as a Black American so to should this book teach us to understand the plight of American tribes.

Quote:

“How’s your mom doing? she said, shaking her head, swiping at her cheeks.
I tried to focus now; my mother was not fine so I could not answer fine. Nor could I tell Sonja that half and hour ago I’d feared my mother was dead and I had rushed upon her and got hit by her for the first time in my life. Sonja lit a cigarette, offered me a piece of Black Jack gum.
Not good, I said. Jumpy.
Sonja nodded. We’ll bring Pearl.” (26)

It is always refreshing when a book is awarded a high honor and it is truly good; good for regular people to enjoy. Thank you to Louise Erdrich for writing such a human story. She owns a lovely little book store in Minneapolis, Birchbark Books.

Grasshopper Jungle

If you want to discover stacks and stacks of good books at your local library you need my friend Tina to go with you. Any time I meet her there she loads me up as we walk down the shelves. On our last trip she handed me Grasshopper Jungle by Andrew Smith and said “here read this, because I can’t, and let me know how it is.” She’s not a fan of dystopia but she was interested in the Iowa setting.

So I read it and for the first 40 pages I kept thinking I should quit. And then I’d read a little more and a little more and then it started to grow on me. At about the half way point I couldn’t stop reading which made me laugh because that’s just what I tell my students-keep going~the really good stuff doesn’t always happen in the beginning. I didn’t almost give up on it though because stuff wasn’t happening-it was the main character, Austin, that drove me nuts. He’s telling us the story as a sort of historical document and we really get to know Austin-it’s his coming-of-age tale after all-right in the middle of the end of the world.

My thoughts were poor Austin all he can think about is being horny and every single page is about his desire to have sex, shit, masturbate, sex, shit, masturbate, with a lot of smoking mixed in. And then just when I thought I couldn’t take his relentless need to talk about it all so much I let it slide~after all he’s 15~and began to appreciate what Austin had to say about his relationship with Robby, his best friend. I loved that he was so confused about his relationship with both Robby and his girlfriend, Shann because it’s tough to be in love with two people at the same time. His friendship with Robby was a breath of fresh air because he cared so deeply. I grew to like him.

I also thought it was a realistic look at small town Iowa with it’s boarded up shops, crazy family drama, and lots of corn. And the book definetely makes a case for not messing with genetics. Say no to GMOs of any kind. And Austin does a great job of reminding us that everything is connected and life is a massive game of 6 degrees of seperation.

Now the huge 6-foot-grasshopper creepy things I can’t even talk about them…

Someone on goodreads mentioned that you either get Andrew Smith or you don’t~and I completely agree. This book is not for everyone but it is good.

Now you don’t have to read it Tina. I thank you for handing it to me though even if my hand now feels a little grubby.

A sample:

It took me a very long time to work up the nerve to kiss Shann Collins, who was the first and only girl I had ever kissed.
There was a possibility that I’d never have kissed her, too, because she was the one who actually initiated the kiss.
It happened nearly one full year after the Curtis Crane Lutheran Academy End-of-the-year Mixed-Gender Mixer.
Like Robby explained to her: I was shy.
I was on the conveyor belt toward the paper shredder of history with countless scores of other sexually confused boys.
After the Curtis Crane Lutheran Academy End-of-the-year Mixed-Gender Mixer, I tried to get Shann to pay more serious attention to me.
I tried any reasonable method I could think of. I joined the archery club when I found out she was a member, and I offered multiple times to do homework with her. Sadly, nothing seemed to result in serious progress.

She finally comes around when he gets in trouble at school for reading The Chocolate Wars by Robert Cormier. If you can handle it you should read it. Welcome to Eden if you do.

Picture Book Frenzy

I went to the library and picked up a so many delightful picture books off the shelf my bag was packed. I usually think I have to be with my friend Tina to overfill my bag but I guess I’ve proved that I can do it all by myself!

I was looking for ideas for school. The collection at my school library is still new to me so I go to the public library to look at the new shelf to see if it is worth buying and maybe it will work its way into a lesson plan.

That’s what happened with Monsters Love School by Mike Austin. What a delightful picture book. I read this to all my kinder and first grade students. It covers the exciting part of going back to school as well as the fears in a fun Muppet-kind of way. We compared monster’s school experience with their own here at Hansen. The illustrations are filled with color and the writing is all over the page. We all loved Ms. Scribble the art teacher with her very clever head of hair. Please Mike Austin bring us more Monsters…they could love Halloween, or Winter, or the playground. Anything. Monsters and students say “more, more, more!”

I also loved Dog Days of School by Kelly DiPucchio and Brian Biggs. Charlie does not like going to school (we all know someone just like this right Groovy Girl…) because he is tired of all the work. One Sunday night Charlie wishes he were a dog so he could stay home and lay around instead of face another week of school work. The next morning Charlie’s done the “freaky friday” thing and is laying on Norman’s dog bed instead of in his own. Norman gets ready for school and Charlie stay home to sleep with adorable results. This will have everyone wishing they could trade places just for one day. An interesting side fact-Brian Biggs is from Little Rock, AR. He also has a a series out called Everything Goes.

Arlo Rolled by Susan Pearson and Jeff Ebbeler; Arlo is a pea and he doesn’t want to be eaten; he wants to grow up. He escapes from his pod and rolls through the yard finding bugs and slugs and dogs until he’s exhausted. While he takes a nap something marvelous happens to him. This is a perfect spring book to talk about plants and how they grow. It also makes a fun anytime read aloud with a lot adventure for one cute little pea.

Creamed Tuna*Fish and peas on Toast by Philip Christian Stead; Amazing illustrations, funny story. Kids will think it is funny. I wanted him to try the creamed tuna fish and peas on toast first before discarding it; it’s just the mother in me. I was hoping he’d end up liking it like green eggs and ham. Nope. Didn’t happen that way but the layered illustrations and the bird antics make it worthwhile anyway. Philip’s website has some beautiful and free music for your listening pleasure.

Little Lola by Julie Saab and David Gothard; Lola starts her day with a to-do list and the last thing on the list is to have an adventure (as every day should). Heading off to school for the day her adventure is perfect until she spots a mouse in the classroom. Hilarious. I hope to see more of Little Lola as she has the right attitude that will have little ones thinking. Brand new husband and wife illustrator/writer team.

If you buy for a school, for yourself, for your lovely grandchildren-any of these would be amazing additions for reading over and over again.

What did you read this weekend?

Meeting Maggie.

I drove 1 1/2 hours last night because Maggie Stiefvater, author of Scorpio Races, Wolves of Mercy Falls and The Raven Boys series, would be speaking at Prairie Lights bookstore. I am a huge fan (already pre-ordered the next in the Raven series) and I thought it would be worth the drive even though I couldn’t get anyone to go with me. What a shame as they missed a very good show.

She was far more entertaining than I’ve ever seen an author be in a funny, grease monkey kind of way. I did not take notes but just enjoyed listening to her variety of stories that she transforms into mini-skits. This is what I remember:

1. She is fascinated with folklore and likes wolves over werewolves.
2. I think she wears black tank tops and black Doc Martens a lot.
3. She is rail thin but mighty.
4. She advised against the age old writer’s wisdom of “write what you know” and was eloquent in her idea that you can research and write way beyond what exists around you.
5. She’s learned to write anywhere now as she travels so much (even on airplanes).
6. She claims not to be a good writer so much as a good thief; stealing bits or parts from life.
7. Her purpose in writing Shiver was to make people cry, to write something that would be poignant like The Time-Traveler’s Wife.
8. She read Watership Down as a young person and then rewrote it with dogs instead of rabbits.
9. I shook hands with her and we had to shake twice, according to her, it needs to be done in equal amounts.
10. She lived for a short time in Hartley, IA but does not have good memories of the experience.

As people got their books and posters signed by her she chatted easily with each person. There were people there that had written her letters and received responses, tweeted, emailed, tumbler’ed her and all received responses. One young man had a brand new Raven Boys tattoo to share with her. The love was big and real all around. She asked many what books they were reading that were great and when it was my turn we chatted about folklore and what a great avenue this was to look at wolves over werewolves and so she didn’t ask me but if she had I would have told her to read Donna Tartt’s The Goldfinch as it is filled with struggling, badly-behaving characters that are still somehow likable, something I think she would appreciate.

It goes so quickly those brief moments of greeting someone that you admire that I wanted to say “Can we meet at the pub for a Guinness after all these other people leave?”

My cache of signed goods:

{Posters Maggie created herself for fans}

If you haven’t read her yet you should…

Book Club Book + Salad recipe

We recently gathered together on a snowy Monday night and discussed Flight Behavior (2012) by one of my favorite writers, Barbara Kingsolver. Our book club was whittled down to just a hardy few as the weather had taken a turn for the worse mid-afternoon. I braved the cold and the icy roads just to talk about this book but also because I’d made an amazing salad to share. We go potluck at these gatherings and I hadn’t been the only one thinking salad or healthy. We shared a brussels sprout salad, a beet salad, a delicious spinach dip, and a light-tasting 5-flavor pound cake. Our plates were pretty as we sat to discuss the book.

Flight Behavior follows Dellarobia Turnbow as she picks her way through her unhappy marriage. One of the symptoms of her sadness is to seek out small-time crush-worthy men in her rural Tennessee community. At the opening she is headed into the woods to meet up with her latest crush, the telephone man, to see if they want to take things one step further. On the way up the mountain that sits right on her family’s property to meet him she stops to breathe and is overwhelmed by a phenomena~she can’t tell if it is fire but something strange has the mountain top trees all lit up. This oddity gives her pause to change her mind and head back down the mountain away from the sin she was thinking of committing.

Dellarobia is a fascinating character that grows immensely during the course of her story. Kingsolver truly is a master storyteller weaving an array of unique characters into a timely and thought-provoking event. What Dellarobia glimpsed on the mountaintop was Monarch butterflies all come to roost on her husband’s land. The migration of this butterfly swoops through Mexico every year for thousands of years and this year they didn’t make it there.

Today on this bitterly cold day I’m not going to make a crack about how global warming can’t be true as it is freezing outside! We are by our very existence altering the course of our earth by the products we use, clear-cutting whole mountaintops of trees, car emissions, food production, energy, and coal plants. It is taking a toll on our home; our world and this fact comes home to roost for Dellarobia as she watches and learns more about this magnificent butterfly.

I loved the climate conversation this book brings to light but on a more simple note Dellarobia’s relationship with her children takes on a magical quality for me. She begins as a mother who is pained by her son Preston’s constant questioning of the universe, making her slip out the back door for a “secret” smoke. She loves her children at all stages throughout but her appreciation for their natural childish qualities readjusts Dellarobia’s thinking. As the butterflies transform her and remind her of what she can still be she emerges as a mother who stokes her own son’s curiosity fueling it with thoughts, theories, and books to pour over. Dellarobia looks at even the little Cordelia, still in diapers, with new and glowing eyes. Hope has sprung and Dellarobia sees a future for her children and herself.

The book is breath-taking and yet I have other Kingsolver stories that I love more-that’s how talented she is. Read NPR’s review.

The salad:
adapted from Yoga Journal (Feb. 2014)

Feel-Good Quinoa Pilaf

1 cup quinoa
1/2 head radicchio, cored and thinly sliced
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
2 T extra-virgin olive oil
1/4 cup dried tart cherries (expensive-could substitute dried cranberries)
1/4 cup pistachios (shelled, of course)
3 T fresh flat-leaf parsley
1/2 tsp sea salt
freshly ground black pepper

1. Put quinoa in a fine mesh strainer, and rinse well under cold water. In a saucepan, bring two cups of water to a boil over high heat. Add quinoa, and reduce heat to low. Cover and simmer until grains are tender and water is absorbed, about 15 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool slightly. Transfer to a large bowl and fluff with a fork to separate grains.

2. Add radicchio, vinegar, olive oil, cherries, pistachios, and parsley to bowl, and stir to mix well. Season with salt and pepper. Serve warm or at room temperature. Delicious!

I made a double batch for book club because we have twelve members and since only half of them showed up I had half a bowl left for lunch during the week. My husband tried it and loved it also.

from Yoga Journal “with melatonin-rich dried cherries, pistachios, which contain B-6, and protein-rich quinoa, this easy weeknight pilaf has nutreints to help you sleep soundly, keep your memory sharp, and maintain healthy muscles.”

Book + Salad = healthy humans
Have a peaceful day.

Room by Emma Donoghue

I know many readers and bloggers have read this one already but I just have to reiterate what an awesome read this one was! What a fresh and youthful voice Donoghue creates for Jack. I love the relationship between the mother and son; that even in this horrific situation she has created this room of love and security. Stolen at 17 by “Old Nick” she has been kept in a restructured and reinforced garden shed at the mercy of his 9:00 visits. Jack is born from this awful relationship and she nurtures him, teaching him only about what exists in their small world. They do have a television to watch but Jack thinks everything on it is pretend; nothing real beyond their walls except the nighttime visits of Old Nick.

The book opens as Jack is turning 5 and his curiosity grows as his “Ma” begins to unveal more than just the existence of their room. She shares with him bits and pieces of her life before “Room” became her world. As Jack struggles with this new information and they plot a course to escape both Ma and Jack struggle with what lays before them. Jack wishes to go back in time to just those few days before he turned 5 when his world was simple and his mother can’t bear living in their prison for another moment. It is heart-breaking as the two of them struggle over what is real and what is not and Jack cannot understand why his mother can’t just be happy in room with him as she has been for the last five years.

Janssen’s review of Room inspired me to keep it high on my radar even though it took me 2 years to actually check it out from the library. Such is my crazy busy life but I’m happy to have read it and will continue to recommend it to friends and family. If you haven’t already read this one, give it a try. Jack will inspire you. Donoghue has several other novels and want to read down her list. I would love to know if others were as striking as this one was? Any suggestions?

Edward Tulane!

I love how Edward looks-Groovy Girl does not like to look at these
beautiful illustrations while we read. It is all in the imagination for her.

I’ve had a writer’s crush on Kate DiCamillo for years. I loved Winn-Dixie first, then fell head-over-heals with The Tale of Despereaux, understood both Tiger’s Rising and The Magician’s Elephant more than most people and now I’ve swooned over The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane! Groovy Girl and I finished reading it tonight and were thrilled by Edward’s crazy long journey!

The quote that stuck to us:

“I am done with being loved,” Edward told her. “I’m done with loving. It’s too painful.”
“Pish,” said the old doll. “Where is your courage?”
“Somewhere else, I guess,” said Edward.
“You disappoint me,” she said. “You disappoint me greatly. If you have no intention of loving or being loved, then the whole journey is pointless. You might as well leap from this shelf right now and let yourself shatter into a million pieces. Get it over with. Get it all over with now.”
“I would leap if I was able,” said Edward.
“Shall I push you?” said the old doll.
“No thank you,” Edward said to her. (189)

Okay, I know this quote shares the true meaning of this tale which makes it a spoiler but one I had to pass on anyway. I specifically marvel at the line “where is your courage?” If you’ve read it, you know it and if not, hopefully it will spur you to read it.

Buy it for a young friend for the holidays!

Edward Tulane’s website.
Judy Freeman’s Reader’s Theatre of ET.
Kate’s website.