Hands across the Moon - Softcover

Meyer, Jane G.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0842382860 ISBN 13: 9780842382861

Publisher: Tyndale House Publishers, 2003

Synopsis

"If you ever need a shoulder to cry on or a hand to hold, mine can reach all the way across the world."

Life isn't what best friends Gretchen and Mia have in mind. They'd looked forward to their junior year together--in California. Then Gretchen had to move to Ecuador . . . a world away. Now nothing's going right for either of them. Gretchen doesn't know Spanish, and she's more than an "outsider" at school. Mia's future is all planned. She's an Olympic-hopeful gymnast. Workouts have been her life. But is that all there is? For both girls it seems that their "across the moon" letters are their best lifeline.

About this title

From School Library Journal:

Grade 6-9–Gretchen, 15, leaves California and her best friend, Mia, when her father gets a professorship in Ecuador. This novel-in-letters describes the very different junior years of both girls. Gretchen is thrust into a foreign culture and language, and the most engaging parts of the narrative are her descriptions of Ecuadorian customs, politics, economy, and culture. Mia is a gymnast training for the Nationals, and possibly a place on the Olympic team. The girls share the stock heartbreaks, embarrassments, and daily dramas of teenage life. Gretchen is courted by a rich boy who turns out to have a girlfriend. Catty girls at her school call her gringa and insult her to her face in Spanish; only the kids in her church group are kind. Mia is mortified and incredulous when her boyfriend asks to sleep with her, as "...he seemed like such a nice boy!" She tears ligaments in her ankle and is concerned that her career may be over. Both girls look to God and church to set things right. The novel descends into such predictable proselytizing that readers know exactly how the girls will resolve every conflict. Their dialogue is stiff and cloying, and the writing style is amateurishly childlike instead of authentically adolescent. This book may be of limited value to parochial schools or a youth-group population for its message if not its literary merit.–Johanna Lewis, New York Public Library
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

About this edition

• Publisher: Tyndale House Publishers
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0842382860
• ISBN 13: 9780842382861
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 197