“No wonder she hasn’t been adopted. She’s a mountain of trouble, that Hollis Woods.” Hollis is twelve years old, and she’s been in plenty of foster homes. She keeps “running money” so she can always tell herself she can get away, and she’s an artist. Hollis is about to be placed in a new foster home, and this time it’s with Josie who is also an artist.
This is a place she could call home, but, day by day, she begins to see that Josie is starting to forget things, and Hollis worries that the mustard lady will take her away. There had been a place, a place where Hollis had been about to be part of a family, where she would belong, and where she would have beaten all the badness. She would have won. Then tragedy struck.
176 pages 978-0439692397 Ages 8-12
Keywords: abandonment, foster child, foster family, love, connection, family, belonging, courage, 8 year old, 9 year old, 10 year old, 11 year old, 12 year old
Recommended by: Barb Langridge, abookandahug.com
*********** Hollis Woods is the place where a baby was abandoned is the baby’s name is an artist is now a twelve-year-old girl who’s been in so many foster homes she can hardly remember them all.
When Hollis is sent to Josie, an elderly artist who is quirky and affectionate, she wants to stay. But Josie is growing more forgetful every day. If Social Services finds out, they’ll take Hollis away and move Josie into a home. Well, Hollis Woods won’t let anyone separate them. She’s escaped the system before; this time, she’s taking Josie with her. Still, even as she plans her future with Josie, Hollis dreams of the past summer with the Regans, fixing each special moment of her days with them in pictures she’ll never forget.
Patricia Reilly Giff captures the yearning for a place to belong in this warmhearted story, which stresses the importance of artistic vision, creativity, and above all, family.---from the publisher
