Blue Willow (Puffin Newbery Library) Book

Ten-year-old Janey Larkin longs for a real home, which is the one thing the Larkins don t seem able to find. For as long as she can recall, her father has been a migrant worker, roaming the southern and western United States in search of temporary work, taking his wife and daughter with him. Rather than attempt to make friends with children she ll just have to leave in a short time, Janey takes refuge in reading. Then the Larkins move into a shack near the Romeros, a happy family which includes Lupe, who is just Janey s age. The girls quickly become friends, and Janey is even able to attend a camp school with a wonderful teacher, making her feel things are too good to be true. As luck would have it, that s precisely the case. Mom gets sick with pneumonia, and Dad can t work. The Larkins don t have the money to pay a doctor -- or rent -- although Mom is too weak to travel. In desperation, Janey gives the landlord her beloved willow plate, her one luxury possession and the only thing she has to remember her birth mother by. As the family is about to leave, she decides to go say goodbye to the plate...which triggers a chain of events that changes the Larkin family s fate forever. Author: Doris Gates Reading Level: Ages 9-12 Format: 176 pages, Paperback Publisher: Puffin (September 30, 1976) ISBN: 978-0140309249