65. The Tenth Mistake of Hank Hooperman by Gennifer Choldenko

listened on Audible

320 pgs.

2024
Middle Grades CRF

Finished 7/20/24
Goodreads rating: 4.55
My rating: 4
Setting: Contemporary American city

My comments: Hank is 11 and his baby sister, Boo, is almost 3.  Their mom has an alcohol problem, a major one, and one day she doesn't come home.  After a week goes by and they're totally out of money, Hank has to figure out what to do.  Watching all the problems of a boy who works very hard to be good and kind as well as the thought-processes he goes through are the highlights of this book.  I feel like a lot happens that is rosier than would actually happen in real life - especially with the child welfare system - but it's nice to have a feel-good story with lots of positive people.

Goodreads synopsis:  When eleven-year-old Hank’s mom doesn’t come home, he takes care of his toddler sister, Boo, like he always does. But it’s been a week now. They are out of food and mom has never stayed away this long… Hank knows he needs help, so he and Boo seek out the stranger listed as their emergency contact.

But asking for help has consequences. It means social workers, and a new school, and having to answer questions about his mom that he's been trying to keep secret. And if they can't find his mom soon, Hank and Boo may end up in different foster homes--he could lose everything.

Gennifer Choldenko has written a heart-wrenching, healing, and ultimately hopeful story about how complicated family can be. About how you can love someone, even when you can’t rely on them. And about the transformative power of second chances.

43. Good Girl, Bad Girl by Michael Robotham

#1 Cyrus Haven
listened on Libby/Bosler Library
narrated by Joe Jameson
Unabridged audio (11:49
2019 Scribner
353 pgs.
Adult Murder Mystery
Finished 3/3/2020
Goodreads rating:
My rating:  4.5
Setting: contemporary UK

First line/s:  " 'Which one is she?' I ask, leaning closer to the observation window."

My comments: This was a pretty interesting story, or actually two stories in one.  Cyrus Haven is a youngish psychologist working with the police on the murder of a 15-year-old ice skater at the same time that he is called in to interview/examine an 18-year-old who is living locked up in a type of state home for troubled youth.  Most of the book is told from Cyrus's point of view, but every now and then there's a chapter that is first person titled "angel face" that is Evie's voice.  Evie's story is by far the most interesting, but there's a nice surprising twist in the murder story that keeps you on the edge throughout the book.  In June of July there'll be a second book detailing more of Evie's backstory.  I really like this protagonist and look forward to more.

Goodreads synopsis:  A girl is found hiding in a secret room in a house being renovated after a terrible crime. For weeks she has survived by sneaking out at night, stealing food for herself and two dogs that are kept in the garden. The nurses at the hospital where she is taken call her “Angel Face” because she won’t tell anyone her name, or her age, or where she came from. Maybe she is twelve, maybe fifteen, or somewhere in between. She doesn’t appear on any missing person’s file, or match the DNA of any murder victim.
          Six years later, still unidentified, the same girl is living in a secure children’s home with a new name, Evie Cormac, when she initiates a court case demanding the right to be released as an adult. Psychologist Cyrus Haven is sent to interview Evie and decide if she’s ready to go free, but Evie Cormac is unlike he’s anyone he’s ever met. She’s damaged, destructive, and self-hating, yet possessed of a gift, or a curse, that makes her both fascinating and dangerous to be with—the ability to tell when someone is lying. Soon he is embroiled in her unique and dangerous world, his life in utmost peril.

51. Where the Forest Meets the Stars by Glendy Vanderah

listened on Audible
read by Lauren Ezzo
Unabridged audio (9:57)
2019 Lake Union Publishing
332 pgs.
Adult CRF
Finished 6/7/2019
Goodreads rating:  4.22 - 22,437 ratings
My rating:  4.5

First line/s:  "The girl could be a changeling.  She was almost invisible, her pale face, hoodie and pants fading into the twilit woods behind her.  Her feet were bare.  She stood motionless, one arm hooked around a hickory trunk , and she didn't move when the car crunched to the end of the gravel driveway and stopped a few yards away."

My comments:  There might be a few very small spoilers in the following response to this book.  Every now and then you read a story that is so touching and so different that you don't care as much about the coincidences and the too-good-to-be-true ending as you might usually.  This was a charming story from beginning to end, where a broken, genius, - and I must say, with a bit of a rolling eye: manipulative - child wins all the good things she deserves.  It's about people that aren't' as broken as they thought they were coming together to make things right.  And make things work.  I enjoyed everything about this book - the characters, the setting, and even the reality of too-stupid-to-be-real laws and child welfare rules.  Highly recommended.

Goodreads synopsis: An Amazon Charts, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Postbestseller.
          In this gorgeously stunning debut, a mysterious child teaches two strangers how to love and trust again.
          After the loss of her mother and her own battle with breast cancer, Joanna Teale returns to her graduate research on nesting birds in rural Illinois, determined to prove that her recent hardships have not broken her. She throws herself into her work from dusk to dawn, until her solitary routine is disrupted by the appearance of a mysterious child who shows up at her cabin barefoot and covered in bruises.
          The girl calls herself Ursa, and she claims to have been sent from the stars to witness five miracles. With concerns about the child’s home situation, Jo reluctantly agrees to let her stay—just until she learns more about Ursa’s past.
          Jo enlists the help of her reclusive neighbor, Gabriel Nash, to solve the mystery of the charming child. But the more time they spend together, the more questions they have. How does a young girl not only read but understand Shakespeare? Why do good things keep happening in her presence? And why aren’t Jo and Gabe checking the missing children’s website anymore?
          Though the three have formed an incredible bond, they know difficult choices must be made. As the summer nears an end and Ursa gets closer to her fifth miracle, her dangerous past closes in. When it finally catches up to them, all of their painful secrets will be forced into the open, and their fates will be left to the stars. 

MOVIE - Instant Family

PG-13 (1:57)

Wide Release11/16/18

Viewed 12/18/18 at Carlisle RC with Ella
IMBd: 7.6/10

RT Critic: 82   Audience:  80
Critic's Consensus:  nstant Family may not quite capture the complexity of real-life adoption, but fittingly for the unconditional bond it honors, this flawed yet well-intentioned dramedy is ultimately worth the investment.

Cag: 5

Directed by Sean Anders

Paramount Pictures

Mark Wahlberg, Rose Byrne, Octavia Spencer, Margo Martindale

My comments:  A delightfully-cast retelling of a true story.  Rose Byrne and Mark Wahlberg have definite onscreen chemistry.  The two social workers are fantastic - and so, so funny, and the cast of other new foster parents are just wonderful.  I laughed a lot, came close to shedding a few tears - though my softy Ella sure did, happy tears.  A super feel-good movie that I would highly recommend.

RT/ IMDb Summary  When Pete (Mark Wahlberg) and Ellie (Rose Byrne) decide to start a family, they stumble into the world of foster care adoption. They hope to take in one small child but when they meet three siblings, including a rebellious 15 year old girl (Isabela Moner), they find themselves speeding from zero to three kids overnight. Now, Pete and Ellie must hilariously try to learn the ropes of instant parenthood in the hopes of becoming a family. INSTANT FAMILY is inspired by the real events from the life of writer/director Sean Anders and also stars Octavia Spencer, Tig Notaro and Margo Martindale.

16. The Opposite of Everyone - Joshilyn Jackson

listened to this on Audible/iPhone
2016 - William Morrow
352 pgs.
Goodreads rating: 4.07
Adult CRF/Mystery
Finished 3/8/16
Setting: Contemporary Atlanta, and other places around the country - a traveling mama

First line/s:  "I was born blue.  If my mother hadn't pushed me out quick as a cat, I would have been born dead and even bluer; her cord was wrapped tight around my neck.  She looked at my little blue lips, my blue toes and baby fingers, and named me after Kali.  Kali Jai."

My comments:  I have definitely become a Joshilyn Jackson fan.  Her story-weaving gets better and better with each book.  She flips back and forth between Kali/Paula at 12 and currently, where we slowly learn/guess her background story.  What great characters!  Her protagonist has so many flaws - making her so real - that you love her and hate her and question her... keeps you busy throughout the whole novel!  I listened to this one, her brand new book.  I usually greatly enjoy her reading, but the voices she used on this one, other than Cali, Kai, and Birdwine, were a little bothersome.  She made her 23-year old brother sound around 12, and I had to keep resetting his image in my mind because of this.  Very engrossing.

Goodreads synopsis: Born in Alabama, Paula Vauss spent the first decade of her life on the road with her free-spirited young mother, Kai, an itinerant storyteller who blended Hindu mythology with Southern Oral Tradition to re-invent their history as they roved. But everything, including Paula’s birthname Kali Jai, changed when she told a story of her own—one that landed Kai in prison and Paula in foster care. Separated, each holding her own secrets, the intense bond they once shared was fractured.
          These days, Paula has reincarnated herself as a tough-as-nails divorce attorney with a successful practice in Atlanta. While she hasn’t seen Kai in fifteen years, she’s still making payments on that Karmic debt—until the day her last check is returned in the mail, along with a cryptic letter. “I am going on a journey, Kali. I am going back to my beginning; death is not the end. You will be the end. We will meet again, and there will be new stories. You know how Karma works.”
          Then Kai’s most treasured secret literally lands on Paula’s doorstep, throwing her life into chaos and transforming her from only child to older sister. Desperate to find her mother before it’s too late, Paula sets off on a journey of discovery that will take her back to the past and into the deepest recesses of her heart. With the help of her ex-lover Birdwine, an intrepid and emotionally volatile private eye who still carries a torch for her, this brilliant woman, an expert at wrecking families, now has to figure out how to put one back together—her own.
          The Opposite of Everyone is a story about story itself, how the tales we tell connect us, break us, and define us, and how the endings and beginnings we choose can destroy us . . . and make us whole. Laced with sharp humor and poignant insight, it is beloved New York Times bestselling author Joshilyn Jackson at her very best.

12. Desert Shadows - Betty Webb

#3 Lena Jones, Phoenix PI
read on my iPhone
2004/2006, Poisoned Pen Press
280 pgs.
Adult murder mystery
Finished 2/22/16
Goodreads rating:  3.82
My rating: 4
Setting:Contemporary Phoenix, AZ

First line/s:  "Gloriana Alden-Taylor wasn't exactly satisfied.  The word rarely appeared in her personal lexicon, but with two new titles due out, Patriot's Blood Press by the end of the week, she felt, at a minimum, gratified."

My comments:  Good mystery, and more unraveling of Lena's own mysterious story.  The setting, of Scottsdale, is somewhat known to me, and I think I'll make sure that on my next adventure that far north I'll take book number 4 with me so that I can check out some of the actual places she talks about!

Goodreads synopsis from Reviewer "Stuart": (The Goodreads synopsis is weirdly misleading, as he also notes...)  This is the third Lena Jones mystery, though only the first I have read. In this story, sub-titled “Publishing can be Murder”, Lena investigates the death of publisher Scottsdale publisher Gloriana Alden-Taylor, who was poisoned at the annual Southwestern Publishers' Convention. She is drawn in to the case because a Pima Indian friend has been accused of the murder.
Gloriana’s publishing house delivers primarily racist texts, so the field is rife with people who may have wanted to kill her, including her grandson, who stands to inherit the publishing house, and who plans to change its direction completely. One of the authors about to be published is a death row inmate, with his own brand of racist drivel, a tract endorsed by the Aryan Brotherhood, whose leaflets Lena encounters everywhere, but which seemingly do not really add anything to the story. I think that’s something that may have been edited out. 
Gloriana turns out to be a complex woman drive by her desires, one of which was her enduring need to secure the genes of her ancestry, from the Mayflower and from President Zachary Taylor. She also turns out not so much to believe in the racism in her books, but in their ability to sell. I was a little annoyed by the digs at the commercial nature of publishing (no-one publishes literature any more, only what sells etc) – perhaps the author has an axe to grind there? 
The book also explores more of Lena’s personal history, she having been brought up in several foster homes, having apparently been shot by her mother at the age of four. She is working out anger management issues with a psychiatrist, and as she does so, we learn more about her past, a story in its own right. And then there is the on/off relationship with her ex-husband, which leads to dangerous encounters, and which will no doubt be a theme of subsequent books. 
The prime suspects end up being the people (publishers) who shared Gloriana’s table at the last dinner of the conference. Lena, who is a private detective and thus has a valid reason for investigating, unlike some others I have read recently (librarians), chases down these suspects, at the risk to her own life at one point. I didn’t feel that all that much detecting went on, however. When the criminal eventually appears, it’s by accident, Lena having focused on the wrong person. That’s not the way to endear me to an author’s work.
However, it was an easy read, and there is a lot in it. I felt it could have been stitched together better – it felt a little choppy, not really smoothly moving towards a conclusion.PS I felt that the Goodreads summary was misleading, even getting Gloriana’s surname wrong, and as the surname was key to the plot, I was surprised. Perhaps taken from an earlier description; the same applies to the Aryan Brotherhood stuff, which seemed to add little to the story, but which was referenced in the Goodreads blurb also.:

7. Silent Scream - Angela Marsons

#1 D.I. Kim Stone; Black Country (West Midlands) England
read on my iPhone.
2015 Book Outure (eBook)
307 pgs.
Adult Murder Mystery - Police Procedural
Finished 2/11/16
Goodreads rating:  3.99
My rating:5, or pretty darn close....
Setting: Black Country, West Midlands, England (though close to Birmingham, not to be confused at all with it - Black Country wants to be called Black Country!  I did research.....)

First line/s:  "Teresa Wyatt had the inexplicable feeling that this night would be her last."

My comments:  I vacillated between 4 and 5 for a long while, but decided that the merits of this book were definitely worthy of a five.  Characterization (lov-er-ly), plot (grizzly and believable, unfortunately-in-a good-way), setting (a part of England I know very little about), protagonist (wow!), and great writing work together to create a difficult-to-put-down story.  So much of the book was peeling off layers of Kim Stone's armor and seeing what motivates her, and the glimpses we get are fascinating.  The best part  - there's still so much left to learn about her personal story in upcoming mysteries.  I'm excited to have found this new-to-me series!

Goodreads synopsis:  Even the darkest secrets can’t stay buried forever… 
     Five figures gather round a shallow grave. They had all taken turns to dig. An adult sized hole would have taken longer. An innocent life had been taken but the pact had been made. Their secrets would be buried, bound in blood …    

     Years later, a headmistress is found brutally strangled, the first in a spate of gruesome murders which shock the Black Country. 

     But when human remains are discovered at a former children’s home, disturbing secrets are also unearthed. D.I. Kim Stone fast realises she’s on the hunt for a twisted individual whose killing spree spans decades.

     As the body count rises, Kim needs to stop the murderer before they strike again. But to catch the killer, can Kim confront the demons of her own past before it’s too late?

      Fans of Rachel Abbott, Val McDermid and Mark Billingham will be gripped by this exceptional new voice in British crime fiction.

58. The Language of Flowers - Vanessa Diffenbaugh

2011, Ballantine Books
324 pages
for adults
HC $25.00 TPPL
Goodreads: 4.04
my rating: 5 (I loved it, didn't want it to end)
Setting:  Contemporary San Francisco and a vineyard and flower farm somewhere an hour and a half north of the Golden Gate Bridge.
1st sentence/s:  "For eight years I dreamed of fire.  Trees ignited as I passed the; oceans burned.  The sugary smoke settled in my hair as I slept, the scent like a cloud left on my pillow as I rose.  Even so, the moment my mattress started to burn, I bolted awake."

I read this book for a book group and became immediately enthralled. It was a delicious read. It was about a flawed foster child trying to figure out who and what and why she was, learning to trust...and love....and be part of a family. It takes place in contemporary San Francisco when Victoria turns 18, but occasionally goes back 8-10 years to the time she lived with Elizabeth, a single, vineyard owner, who planned to adopt Victoria. You know right from the start that something went terribly wrong during that time, but we don't discover exactly what it was until nearer the end of the book. There was a lot of information about flowers and the Victorian meanings of flowers, but it was all presented in a fascinating, interesting way so that even without a particular enjoyment of flowers it held my total attention.  Victoria's plight includes self-chosen homelessness, growing plants in public parks in San Francisco, stealing (food and flowers and anything she needed), discovering her business savvy, and learning to trust herself and not always running away.

One word for Victoria:  Bravo!  Thanks goodness I have never had to feel any of the abandonement or anguish that she did.

45. Summer of the Gypsy Moths - Sara Pennypacker

2012, Balzer + Bray/ Harper Collins
275 pages
for: Middle Grades (ages 9-12)
rating:  5

1st line/s:  "The earth spins at a thousand miles an hour.  Sometimes when I remember this, it's all I can do to stay upright --- the urge to flatten myself to the ground and clutch hold is that strong."
Setting:  Current day Cape Cod, at the Linger Longer Cottage Colony.
OSS:  11 year-old Stella and 12-year-old Angel, both foster children , secretly run the Linger Longer Cottage Colony when Stella's great-aunt dies and they bury her in the garden, pretending she's still around, so that they won't be sent back to the foster care system.

It's quite a premise, but written beautifully and believably.  The girls have no way to get to a grocery story, so they almost starve.  Little glimmers of help come in unexpected ways - people leaving food in the refrigerator and cupboards when they leave their rental, digging clams on the beach, using the great-aunt's credit card to order pizza delivery.  They have no problem cleaning the four cottages and dealing with the cottage's problems - Stella has been a Heloise and her Hints addict for years.  And George, the fisherman-owner of the cottages checks in every so often to mow the lawn and take care of any problems that the girls can't handle. Stella even figures out how to take care of the garden that her aunt Louise planted, including her much-loved blueberry bushes, saving them from the infestation of gypsy moths.

SPOILER:  Even the death of Louise is handled in a believable way, from what it looks like, what it smells like, and how they figured out what to do with her body. This is a delightful story.  It has somewhat of a "pat" ending, but it's totally believable, too.  (And thank goodness Stella's flighty, possibly bipolar does NOT have a miraculous recovery in order to be able to care for her child.)

This was a wonderful story, about how friendship grows and what the real meaning of "family" is.

54. Darkness Becomes Her - Kelly Keaton

Simon Pulse, 2011
HC $16.99
274 pgs.
for:  Young Adults
Rating:  4.5

First Line/s: Under the cafeteria table, my right knee bounced like a jackhammer possessed.  Adrenaline snaked through my limbs, urging me to bolt, to hightail it out of Rocquemor House and never look back.

Setting:  Over a decade after the 2009 hurricanes ruined New Orleans, now called New 2.  It's no longer part of the USA, and it's home to people that are.....different.

One sentence summary:  Ari, a 17 year-old searching for her mother and her roots, discovers the horrifying legacy that has been passed down to her through centuries of tormented women.

Yes, this one held my attention completely.  I guess I enjoy these dystopian adventures.  This one, of course, includes the smolderingly handsome love interest. Sebastian is the interestingly different part vampire whose family is one of the Novem, the ruling elite of the new New Orleans.  However, Ari holds a power that she doesn't understand at all - many people that she encounters, the ones that know of her mother, show that they are ... afraid ... of her.

I slowly figured out the mystery before it was revealed, but it was fun doing so.  Someone with more of an interest/background in Greek mythology would probably figure it out long before I did.  But I'll read the sequel when it comes out, A Beautiful Evil, coming in February, 2012.  It will continue the adventure, I'm sure.

If I knew New Orleans, the layout and the history, it would be even more enjoyable, because the description is excellent.

28. Numbers - Rachel Ward

Chicken House/Scholastic, 2010
$9.99 (library)
325 pgs.
For YA
Rating:  2

I saw Chaos in the bookstores, which is the next book in the series.  The premise sounded good, so I got Numbers to read first.  Interesting idea, but the plot was slow and the characters were not very interesting or likeable for me.  I just never felt like I could get into either Jem or Spider's heads at all, and the foster mother certainly needed more fleshing out.....

Jem's a foster child, her mother overdosed when she was very young.  She's been shuffled from foster home to foster home since, making no friends, living with a huge chip on her shoulder.  She doesn't look many people in the eye, because when she does, she sees a a list of numbers that's a date.....and she figured out quite young that the date signifies when they are going to die.  There's nothing she can do about it, so she's become a loner.

She meets Spider, a tall, smelly, black young man that's in one of her school classes, and despite the fact that he doesn't have long to live (she never tells anyone about this), they become friends.  Then an unexpected incident sets them both on the run from the authorities..  As they set off across the countryside together they end up closely bonding.  It was very s s s l l l o o o o o w w w w for me.  Not enough going on, including conversation.  Just didn't sit right with me. 

So I guess I won't be reading Chaos, which I think is about Jem's son, sometime in the future.

29. Touch Blue - Cynthia Lord

2010, Scholastic paperback
186 pgs.
for:  middle grades
Rating:  4.5

I was able to obtain six copies of Touch Blue for the last literature circles of the year, but offered it without having the time to read it. I’d read ABOUT it, and enjoy (very much) Cynthia Lord’s blog. I know – and trust her – as an author. And it’s set in Maine, for crying out loud. Six kids were in the group. Six kids loved the book

Well now I just finished reading it myself. It’s a perfect book for fourth graders. It covers all sorts of things to talk about: living on an actual island that is only accessible by boat, what a “family” is, believing in superstitions, good luck/bad luck, and how it might feel not to be able to live with your own parents. It has a token bully to ponder. Content-wise, music and lobster fishing also have big parts in the novel. Monopoly, talent shows, irritating little sisters and the Boston Red Sox….I could go on and on.

When a family with many kids moves from Bethsaida Island to the mainland, the state of Maine decides there aren’t enough children to keep the island school open. So some of the families decide to take in foster kids. Tess’s family gets Aaron, a red-headed, 13-year-old gifted musician who has already been shuffled around in Maine’s foster care system. Tess’s dad, a lobster fisherman and her mom, the school’s only teacher, open up their home and their hearts; and both Tess and her little sister, Libby, are greatly looking forward to having a brother. Of course things are very rocky. Small town gossip and the local bully don’t help matters, either.

Since the story is told in the first person by Tess, the reader can get inside her head and see what her fears, her hopes, and her miseries truly are. It’s a lovely story with an ending that looks to the future and might give kids a reason to look beyond the surface in the lives of other kids and not always take everything at face value.

(‘Course, it doesn’t hurt that I lived for 30 years on an island – the kind you can drive onto – on the coast of Maine.)
 Loved this:

“Summer is short and changeable in Maine – like the weather can’t make up its mind. One day it can be ninety degrees, so hot in the sun that rivers of sweat trickle down my spine and my rubbersized hauling pants stick to my skin wherever they touch it. A week later, it can turn so chilly and foggy that I’ll need jeans and a sweatshirt. The talk at the store is always the weather and the Red Sox – starting with whichever one is doing worse.”

“Yup, it’s a good one, Burt…..”

Cynthia Lord’s website
Cynthia Lord's blog (She includes lots of photos she takes wherever she goes, I really enjoy it.)

76. Solomon's Oak - Jo-Ann Mapson

2010, Bloomsbury
TPPL
371 pgs.
For: adults
Rating: 4

I remember my friend, Carol, talking about Jo-Ann Mapson, so when I was this sitting on the "New Books" shelf at the library, I decided to try it. Thanks, Carol!

I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the setting, which is in the farmlands east of Monterey, California. I enjoyed the characters, although I couldn't quite get into the protagonists head, although Mapson tried really hard. I am not an animal lover and this is a book about animal lovers....horses, goats, and dogs, particularly. However, I didn't mind it at all, and enjoyed learning bout the different personalities of each.

Three people with emotional wounds are brought together. The protagonist, a farm woman who lost her dearly beloved husband of 20-or-so years unexpectedly the previous year, a New Mexican crime lab photographer that has been injured in a shootout and must learn to live with intense pain - physically and emotionally - for the rest of his life, and a teenage girl with a huge chip on her shoulder and even more loss. Her sister disappeared four years before, and that led to her mother's death and her father's abandonment. Whoa!

The story is well told, though almost repetitious in places. However, it went fast and was entertaining and made me think....deeply. The widow, Glory Solomon, is coping with money problems and begins a small business holding weddings and the reception at the chapel her husband had built, and in their barn. The cop, Joseph Vigil, is making a photographic studies of trees, and the teenager, Juniper McGuire, complete with multiple piercings and even a tattoo, is quickly put to work helping with catering the weddings and lots of farm chores.

These people, and people like them, are everywhere. Out there. In our world. Trying to live with the heartbreak and anxiety and unfairness of life. Parts of each of them are in many of us. It doesn't hurt to be reminded of this once in awhile.

63. Where I'd Like to Be - Frances O'Roark Dowell

Audio read by Denise Wilbanks (in a great southern accent)
Listening Library, 2003
4 unabridged cds
4 hrs. 3 min.
240 pages
Rating: 4.5

I listened to this story. At first I was just a tiny bit put off by the very southern accent, but Denise Wilbanks did a superior job. The story is set in rural Tennessee, and that accent really accentuated the setting. (ha - good one, right?)

Maddie lives in the East Tennesse Children's Home. She has been in a number of foster homes since her birth, and she's a great, philosophical kid. Her best friend is a six-year old named Ricky Ray, another great kid who she cares about a lot. Then one day a new girl arrives. Murphy is different, and Maddie is mesmerized by her. Murphy has been places, has seen things, and has magical ideas and dreams.

Throughout her life, Maddie has been creating a "book of houses" and a "book of people." It sounds like they're created from those black-marble-ized journals. She has cut-out pictures of houses and people lovingly glued in. She and Ricky Ray create story after story of happy times in loving homes.

So five good friends decide to create a "house" of their own. With help, they build a fort in the woods that becomes their haven. But naturally, the course of life is not always smooth. Bumps appear. Foster homes, real parents coming out of rehab, possible adoption.....and decisions. Tough decisions for 11 and 12 year olds.

Great story. Almost a five....there are a few places that might have had a bit more detail. I loved it.