See You Down The Road by Kim Ablon Whitney (Knopf, 2004). Bridget has been raised a Traveler, leading the life in trailer after trailer, city after city, with her friends and family–no roots, little school, running scams, casing pigeons, hearing the pros and cons of a really big score. At 16, she’s already engaged, and her older brother Jimmy is enamored with the idea of following in Big Jim’s footsteps to pull in huge money. It’s a culture within the culture, with its own rules and (sometimes sexist) norms. It’s the life. But is it the life for Bridget? Ages 12-up.

My Thoughts

The voice is engaging and intriguing, the characters fully realized. Given her point of view, I understood Bridget’s choices, even when I didn’t agree with them. A wonderful, compelling read.

I’ve been wanting to read this title for some time. It was a winner of the 2001 SCBWI Judy Blume/Work-In-Progress Grant for a Contemporary Novel for Young People and the 2002 PEN/New England Children’s Book Caucus Discovery Award. More recently it was named to the 2005 BBYA list.

Nifty Links

Author Jacqueline Davies now offers teacher guides for her award-winning books, Where The Ground Meets The Sky (Cavendish) and The Boy Who Drew Birds: The Story Of John James Audubon (Houghton Mifflin).

Where The Ground Meets The Sky (ages 10-14) was an NCSS Notable Social Studies Trade Book, an IRA/CBC Children’s Award Notable Book For Fiction/Intermediate, and named to the Bank Street Best Children’s Books list among other honors.

The Boy Who Drew Birds was a Junior Library Guild selection and an Outstanding Science Trade Book for Students K-12 in 2005. It also has been selected for the New York Public Library’s Best Books for 2004 list.

Adria’s Book Nook: Adria recommends books she’s loved and read with her little sister Louisa. How charming is that? By the way, these girls are the daughters of author Haemi Balgassi. As in apple. Tree. Not far falling.