Children's Fiction Orphans & Foster Homes
Flower
- Publisher
- Tundra
- Initial publish date
- Mar 2005
- Category
- Orphans & Foster Homes, Girls & Women, General
- Recommended Age
- 9 to 12
- Recommended Grade
- 4 to 7
-
Paperback / softback
- ISBN
- 9780887767104
- Publish Date
- Mar 2005
- List Price
- $12.99
Classroom Resources
Where to buy it
Description
Thirteen-year-old Katie is an unwilling summer guest in the Victorian home of her Halifax grandparents. All she wants to do is stay in her attic bedroom and brood. Disgruntled over her new stepmother’s pregnancy and how a baby might affect her life, Katie takes refuge in her dreams of playing the part of the disagreeable orphan Mary Lennox in the upcoming school production of The Secret Garden.
When Katie sees a shadow on her bedroom wall of an old-fashioned girl holding a flower, she tries to convince herself it is caused by moonlight. But the girl reappears and shares her life with Katie, reaching across the years to her. Is she a ghost? As Katie searches for some tangible evidence of the girl’s presence, she discovers a package of letters from World War I containing clues to a bygone time when British orphans were sent to Canada as Home Children.
In this haunting journey of a young girl looking for answers and an orphan girl from the past who tries to provide them, award-winning novelist Irene N. Watts uncovers a tale about the real meaning of family.
About the author
In 1968 Irene N. Watts came to Canada from Britain, where she had arrived thirty years earlier from Germany, via Kindertransport. She is a writer/playwright, theatre director, and educator. Her plays for young audiences have been widely produced. Awards include a Vancouver Theatre Alliance Jessie Richardson for Goodbye Marianne (Scirocco Drama and Anchorage Press, U.S.); the Geoffrey Bilson Award for Historical Fiction for Young People; the Isaac Frischwasser Memorial Award (Helen and Stan Vine Canadian Jewish Book Awards, 1999 and 2001); the Government of Alberta Achievement Award for Outstanding Service to Drama. Irene is a Lifetime Member of the Playwrights Guild of Canada. Recent publications include Tapestry of Hope: Holocaust Writing for Young People, compiled with Lillian Boraks-Nemetz (Tundra Books).
Librarian Reviews
Flower
The haunting journey of a young girl looking for answers and an orphan girl from the past who inadvertently provides them. The acclaimed author explores the real meaning of family.Source: The Canadian Children’s Book Centre. Canadian Children’s Book News. 2006.
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Good-bye Marianne
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