Blue (Bakers Mountain Stories) - Hardcover

Hostetter, Joyce Moyer

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1590783891 ISBN 13: 9781590783894

Publisher: Calkins Creek, 2006

Synopsis

With her father away at war to fight Hitler, a young girl gains strength by joining her community in battling polio in this Parents' Choice Silver Honor Book based on the 1944 epidemic and the "Miracle of Hickory" Hospital in Hickory, North Carolina. Ann Fay Honeycutt accepts the role of "man of the house" when her father leaves because she wants to do her part for the war. She's doing well with the extra responsibilities when a frightening polio epidemic strikes, crippling many local children. Her town of Hickory responds by creating an emergency hospital in three days. Ann Fay reads each issue of the newspaper for the latest news of the epidemic. But soon she discovers for herself just how devastating polio can be. As her challenges grow, so does her resourcefulness. In the face of tragedy, Ann Fay discovers her ability to move forward. She experiences the healing qualities of friendship and explores the depths of her own faithfulness to those she loves—even to one she never expected to love at all.

About this title

About the Author:

Joyce Moyer Hostetter is the author of Best Friends Forever. She received a BA in early childhood education at Lenoir Rhyne College in Hickory, North Carolina. Since then, she has continued her studies on the graduate level in special education at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte, and art at James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia. She lives near Hickory.

From Booklist:

Gr. 4-7. Thirteen-year-old Ann Fay always wanted to be just like her father, but when he gives her a pair of overalls before going off to fight Hitler, her feelings are mixed: "Wearing britches so I could take the place of my daddy wasn't the same as wearing them so I could climb trees." [...] Hostetter weaves her own North Carolina community's history into heartfelt fiction, marked by an agreeable, vernacular narrative and unobtrusive symbolism surrounding the color blue--the hue of both Ann Fay's overalls and the pesky wisteria vine that, like grown-up responsibility made palpable, threatens to overtake her victory garden. An incongruous structural rift mars the novel's latter half, set in the polio hospital, where the heart-tugging family drama gives way to a programmatic story line about an obstacle-laden friendship between Ann Fay and an African American patient. Still, the intriguing history of the illness and the powerful first-person voice will propel readers through to the novel's deeply satisfying conclusion. Jennifer Mattson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

About this edition

• Publisher: Calkins Creek
• Publication date: 2006
• ISBN 10: 1590783891
• ISBN 13: 9781590783894
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 200