Chasing Redbird - Softcover

Creech, Sharon

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0064406962 ISBN 13: 9780064406963

Publisher: HarperCollins, 1998

Synopsis

Zinnia Taylor has looked at those words, embroidered on a sampler hanging in her aunt Jessie's kitchen, for as long as she can remember. In her 13 years Zinny has rummaged through the spaghetti of her life, hoping for a meatball, but often finding lumps of mud instead.

Zinny lives in Bybanks, Kentuckey, with too many brothers and sisters -- a mess of "tadpoles" and "pumpkins" is what her uncle Nate calls them. When Zinny discovers a mysterious, overgrown trail that begins on her family's farm, she's determined to clear it, from start to finish. She's finally found a place of her own, a place where she can go, away from her family, to hear herself think. But what Zinny didn't realize is that the mysteries of the trail are intertwined with her own spaghetti of unanswered questions and family secrets, and that the trail -- and her passion to uncover -- is leading her on a journey home.

Newberry Medal winnner Sharon Creech's new novel is a powerful, beautifully crafted story about a young girl discovering that life is a tangle of mysteries, surprises and everyday occurences -- a journey that often needs unravelling and that sometimes must be traveled alone.

About this title

Review

Chasing Redbird is one of Sharon Creech's four novels written for children including the earlier prizewinning Walk Two Moons. In Chasing Redbird Creech's magnificent storytelling evokes the wilderness of the Kentucky countryside where bears and snakes and the thick undergrowth of an overgrown trail both challenges the young 13-year-old Zinny to solitary adventure and gives her the mental and physical space to deal with her repressed feelings about the death of her cousin when she was a toddler and with the very recent death of her dearly beloved mother-surrogate, "Redbird" aunt Jessie. As well as learning to face the painful fact of death, the novel is also about growing up, and coming to terms with the fears and hopes of adolescence and burgeoning sexuality. This is a stirring adventure story at the same time as being a deeply moving one. It is bound to win the hearts of younger teens. --Tamsin Palmer

Review

"Intriguing, delightful, and touching."--School Library Journal (starred review)

"Creech's best yet."--Publishers Weekly (starred review)

About this edition

• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 0064406962
• ISBN 13: 9780064406963
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 272
• Illustrator: Burckhardt Marc