Lara's Gift - Hardcover

O'Brien, Annemarie

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0307931749 ISBN 13: 9780307931740

Publisher: Knopf Books for Young Readers, 2013

Synopsis

Young Lara is being groomed in the family tradition to take over as Count Voronstov's next kennel steward, breeding borzoi dogs worthy of the Tsar. But then Lara's baby brother is born and she finds herself supplanted as her father decides to make her brother the next kennel steward. Going against her father's wishes and becoming increasingly sure of her special gift of understanding these incredible dogs, Lara risks everything when she reveals the truth about her visions. Now she must save Zar, her favorite borzoi and the one she raised from birth, from a hungry pack of wolves. Only then can she find her own, extraordinary destiny. . . .

About this title

About the Author

ANNEMARIE O'BRIEN has an MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults from Vermont College of Fine Arts. She teaches writing courses at UC Berkeley and Stanford. Before that, she worked for many years in Russia, where she got her first borzoi dog. Annemarie lives in Northern California with her two daughters and two borzoi dogs.

From School Library Journal

Gr 5-8–Lara Ivanova Bogdanova loves the borzoi, the dogs her father breeds on the Count's estate in imperial Russia. Training and caring for the animals alongside her father, she dreams of following him as kennel steward. Then her baby brother is born, and she is devastated when her father determines that she will marry instead. But visions regarding the dogs still come to her despite her father's demand that she stop them. She knows that Zar, the runt she saved from death despite her father's disapproval, has an important part to play in hunting the wolves that plague the estate if only her father would give him a chance. The story develops beautifully from Lara's saving Zar and moves swiftly through the conflicts between Lara and her father as well as the confrontations between Zar and the wolves. Lara bravely steps forward to fight for her dreams in an era in which women were seen as fit only to be wives and mothers, seamstresses and midwives. Birth and fight scenes are handled realistically and factually. The imagery creates a vivid sense of time and place. Compelling historical fiction, this is also a powerful story about the bond between dogs and humans, fathers and daughters. The author's note explains how the story came to be written and which minor aspects of the time and place were adapted to fit it.–Heidi Grange, Summit Elementary School, Smithfield, UTα(c) Copyright 2013. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

About this edition

• Publisher: Knopf Books for Young Readers
• Publication date: 2013
• ISBN 10: 0307931749
• ISBN 13: 9780307931740
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 208