Middle Grade
Miguel is right in the middle, too young to get everything he wants, like his older brother Gabriel; too old to be happy with everything he he has, like little Pedro... This last great adventure of a boy and his first great adventure as a man has its own peculiar mystery, its own special enchantment, because it takes place away out there between the Sangre de Cristo Mountains and the gorge of the Rio Grande.
Awarded the 1954 Newbery Medal, ...And now Miguel is based on the film of the same title produced by the author for the U.S. State Department in 1953.
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When The Happy Orpheline was published, The Horn Book said, "Little girls will wish the book were longer! Garth Williams' strong pen-and-ink sketches, full of life and laughter, match the imagination and French flavor of the writing." Now there is more about the happy orphanage in France. The orphelines, still filled with zest and imagination, find a baby boy on their doorstep. Of course, they are utterly enchanted. The only question is how the twenty fond foster sisters are to manage to keep their new brother. Josine, the youngest, solves the problem in the most thoroughly satisfactory mannner. Once again Natalie Savage Carlson and Garth Williams have joined forces to give young readers a book they will treasure for years to come.
From the book jacket: "When the swan that was missing from the park is found in the orphelines' garden, the little girls reallize that they desperately need a pet. Madame Flattot obtains official permission, and trouble begins. For how can twenty girls decide on one animal?"
Abel's place in his familiar, mouse world has always been secure; he had an allowance from his mother, a comfortable home, and a lovely wife, Amanda. But one stormy August day, furious flood water carry him off and dump him on an uninhabited island. Despite his determination and stubborn resourcefulness--he tried crossing the river with boats and ropes and even on stepping-stones--Abel can't find a way to get back home.
Days, then weeks and months, pass. Slowly, his soft habits disappear as he forages for food, fashions a warm nest in a hollow log, models clay statues of his family for company, and continues to brood on the problem of how to get across the river--and home.
Abel's time on the island brings him a new understanding of the world he's separated from. Faced with the daily adventure of survival in his solitary, somewhat hostile domain, he is moved to reexamine the easy way of life he had always accepted and discovers skills and talents in himself that hold promise of a more meaningful life, if and when he should finally return to Mossville and his dear Amanda again.
Abel's Island is a 1976 New York Times Book Review Notable Children's Book of the Year and Outstanding Book of the Year, and a 1977 Newbery Honor Book.
The Ninth was strong
and fought with might,
But lone Orannis
was put out of the light,
Broken in two
and buried under hill,
Forever to lie there,
wishing us ill.
So says the song. But Orannis, the Destroyer, is no longer buried under hill. It has been freed from its subterranean prison and now seeks to escape the silver hemispheres, the final barrier to the unleashing of its terrible powers.
Only Lirael, newly come into her inheritance as the Abhorsen-in-Waiting, has any chance of stopping the Destroyer. She and her companions -- Sam, the Disreputable Dog, and Mogget -- have to take that chance. For the Destroyer is the enemy of all Life, and it must be stopped, though Lirael does not know how.
To make matters worse, Sam's best friend, Nick, is helping the Destroyer, as are the necromancer Hedge and the Greater Dead Chlorr, and there has been no word from the Abhorsen Sabriel or King Touchstone.
Everything depends upon Lirael. A heavy, perhaps even impossible burden for a young woman who just days ago was merely a Second Assistant Librarian. With only a vision from the Clayr to guide her, and the rather mixed help of her companions, Lirael must search in both Life and Death for some means to defeat the Destroyer.
Before it is too late. . . .
Here is a story of thirteenth-century England, so absorbing and lively that for all its authenticity it scarcely seems "historical." Although crammed with odd facts and lore about that time when "longen folke to goon on pilgrimages," its scraps of song and hymn and jongleur's tale of the period seem as newminted and fresh as the day they were devised, and Adam is a real boy inside his gay striped surcoat.
"Engaging and beautifully written."--Children's Literature From the Trade Paperback edition.