fathers and daughters

Hotel Balzaar

Sophie Rosen ,

DiCamillo, Kate. Hotel Balzaar. Somerville, MA: Candlewick Press, 2024.
Marta and her mother live in a hotel. All day long, while her mother is cleaning rooms, Marta, quietly and invisibly wanders the hallways, wondering about about her father, who has disappeared. But things change when a mysterious visitor appears: a countess with an exotic parrot and seven strange stories. This heart-warming novel – illustrated by Júlia Sardà – is sure to intrigue readers 9 to 11 years old who enjoy stories with a touch of magic.

More stories by Kate DiCamillo

Coyote Lost and Found

Sophie Rosen , ,

Gemeinhart, Dan. Coyote Lost and Found. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 2024.
How do you write a humorous story about grief? Ask Cynthia Rylant. In Missing May, a girl and her uncle go on a road trip to find a medium who can contact a dead aunt. Ask Gary Schmidt. In The Labours of Hercules Beal, a boy has to recreate the labours of the mythical Hercules. Ask Christopher Edge. InThe Many Worlds of Albie Bright, the main character searches for his mother in an alternate universe. Or read this new novel – a sequel toThe Remarkable Journey of Coyote Sunrise – by Dan Gemeinhart. 
Coyote and her father have finally settled in a small Oregon town after years of grief spent wandering the country in their converted bus named Yager. Then Coyote finds a box containing her mother’s ashes hidden on the bus, and the two start on a madcap cross-country journey to discover the place where her mother’s ashes should be spread. Friends come along, new friends are made along the way, and hope for future happiness finally arrives in this heart-warming novel for readers 10 to 13 years old. (Alert: the main character swears, not frequently, but often enough that readers who might be bothered should probably skip this novel.)

More stories of grief

More stories set in the U.S.A.

Another novel by Dan Gemeinhart

More humorous stories

Etty Darwin and the Four Pebble Problem

Sophie Rosen , , , ,

Soloy, Lauren. Etty Darwin and the Four Pebble Problem. Toronto: Tundra, 2021.
Where do you like to go when you want to think about big questions? Do you have a favourite place where your imagination can fly and your mind can ponder? Etty and her father, Charles Darwin, like to take a daily walk in their garden. They observe plants and animals and talk about big questions. Like this one: Do fairies exist? Etty’s father prefers proof before believing something is real, but Etty reminds him that he can’t disprove the existence of fairies. The two of them decide to keep an open mind.
This imaginative picture book – with an afterward explaining a bit about the real life of Charles Darwin – is highly recommended for readers 6 to 11 years old who have their own curious questions about life. 

More books by Canadian writers and artists

More stories set in the past

Biographies of Charles Darwin

Prairie Lotus

Sophie Rosen , , , , ,

Park, Linda Sue. Prairie Lotus. Boston: Clarion Books, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2020.
Hanna and her father move to Dakota Territory in the spring of 1880. Her mother has died from injuries incurred during anti-Chinese riots in Los Angeles, and her father – a dressmaker – wants to start afresh in a new place where they will be safe. Hanna is supposed to stay out of sight. People tend to be cruel to half-Chinese and half-white people, and her father – originally from Tennessee – wants to shield his daughter and protect his business prospects. But Hanna wants to go to school. She’s a teenager now and has dreams of someday earning a graduation diploma. Will her father allow her to attend school? Will the townspeople allow her to mingle with their children? Will she make any friends in this new place? At the end of the book, Park explains why she modelled the setting of her story after the Laura Ingalls Wilder stories and how she, herself, has faced many of the racist attacks depicted in her novel. This 247-page award-winning book, printed in an easy-to-read font with widely spaced lines, is highly recommended for readers 11 to 14 years old.

More stories set in the U.S.A.

More historical novels

The Secrets of Blueberries…

Sophie Rosen , , , , ,

Nickerson, Sara. The Secrets of Blueberries, Brothers, Moose & Me. New York: Dutton Children’s Books, 2015.
Twelve-year-old Missy and her older brother Patrick convince their parents to let them get a job picking blueberries. But Missy acquires much more than money during the summer. She learns how people change. How life doesn’t stay the same. And sometimes there is no one to blame. Sometimes things just happen.
This 323-page novel with a relatively large font and well-spaced lines of print is easy to read. It flows smoothly with lots of conversation and short paragraphs.
Some novels written from the first person point of view seem too self-centred. This story, though, suits this approach. The difficulties of adolescence, the frustrations of life, the slow change of perspective on life are all empathetically portrayed in this introspective story recommended for readers 11 to 14 years old.

More stories of summer