★ 02/20/2017
When 12-year-old Fella’s biological mother, Mama Lacy, becomes sick with cancer, her family moves from Asheville, N.C., to small-town West Virginia to be closer to relatives. After Mama Lacy’s death, Fella’s other mother, Mama Shannon, falls into depression, and Mama Lacy’s mother, Mrs. Madison, wins custody of Fella, separating her from Mama Shannon and Fella’s 16-year-old sister, Zany. Zany’s furtive plan to grant Mama Lacy’s final wish by scattering her ashes near their old home drives the novel. Sneaking their mother’s urn from Mrs. Madison’s mantle, the girls embark on a madcap nighttime road trip, which takes one surprising turn after another. Their car overheats, a teenage thief steals the urn, and they end up hitchhiking with him (and later “borrowing” his truck). Dooley (Free Verse) skillfully balances the troubling story of a family torn apart with Fella’s lively, humorous narrative: “We’re either going to go to jail or get in trouble with Mrs. Madison—and I am not sure which is worse.” When Mama Shannon and Mrs. Madison join forces to find the girls, possibilities for a new family configuration offer hope in this moving, entertaining, and thought-provoking tale. Ages 10–up. (Apr.)This review has been corrected to properly reflect the custody situation referred to in the second sentence.
Praise for Ashes to Asheville:
A School Library Journal Best Book of 2017
A 2018 ALSC Children’s Notable
2018 Rainbow List Book
A 2019 Intermediate Sequoya Master List Pick
★ “Dooley’s portrait of two sisters still struggling with grief and huge life changes makes for a powerful, absorbing read. . . . A tender, touching, and timely read.”—Booklist, starred review
★ “Dooley (Free Verse) skillfully balances the troubling story of a family torn apart with Fella’s lively, humorous narrative . . . in this moving, entertaining, and thought-provoking tale.”—Publishers Weekly, starred review
★ “Poignantly told with verve and a splash of humor, this novel explores sensitive topics with care and belongs in all middle grade collections.”—School Library Journal, starred review
“Dooley packs plenty of emotion into this eventful road trip . . . Breathless and engaging, Fella's distinctive voice is convincingly childlike.”—Kirkus Reviews
“A warm tale of family possibilities after bereavement.”—BCCB
“Some books can sweep you away in the first sentence.”—NPR
“In her exquisite, poignant novel, Sarah Dooley (Free Verse; Body of Water) explores the strange places grief takes people.”—Shelf Awareness
“[A] believable, touching story of loss and healing.”—VOYA
Praise for Free Verse:
★ “Dooley subtly exposes readers to poetic forms that invite engagement, understanding, and expression, while Sasha and her extended family are depicted with a sweetness reminiscent of Cynthia Rylant—a southern soulfulness that is warm even as it reveals the downtrodden struggles of a mining community.”—Booklist, starred review
★ “The changes in [Sasha’s] life, the anguish she feels, and her journey forward are expertly portrayed through Dooley’s use of first-person narration, which is sensitive and gentle without being soft or sentimental. The poetry is wonderful and feels authentic to Sasha’s years…”—School Library Journal, starred review
★ “In this gripping story, Dooley balances a clear-eyed depiction of families wrestling with addiction, financial stress, and trauma with the astonishing resilience of children and the human capacity for love.”—Publishers Weekly, starred review
“Sarah Dooley mixes poetry and prose to powerful, poignant effect in her novel Free Verse... This story brims with hard-won insight into the travails and small joys of life.”—The Washington Post
“Sasha is a natural with words. They bubble out of her, spilling emotions onto paper that she couldn’t otherwise articulate. And as she experiments with different forms, Sasha discovers poetry’s double blessing: The structure stabilizes her, while the creativity sets her free.”—The Christian Science Monitor
“The story mounts a quiet defense of the nobility of broken people… who hold on when all seems lost and sacrifice much out of love for their children. Sasha’s quietly moving poems… trace the evolution of her appreciation for what she has and her understanding that one must find one’s own way to wholeness after loss.”—The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books
“Dooley cleverly weaves into her novel different verse forms… giving her protagonist poet… the courage to stay put long enough to let the strength of her emotions settle inside. Dooley winningly combines engaging plot twists and rich character development with the introspective and thematic power of poetry: not to be missed.”—Kirkus Reviews
“Dooley shows readers the richness of small-town life… Tween fans of realistic fiction will find depth in this novel.”—VOYA
“Sasha lives in a tough coal mining world, and the hurts of her losses are deep. But her ability to see the beautiful and the lovely and the goodness of the world around her is equally deep, and her skill in expressing that depth is one of the things that will save her. This novel is a triumph of art over loss, a story that will make you believe in the capacities of poetry.”—Gary Schmidt, author of Newbery Honor-winning The Wednesday Wars
“Free Verse is exactly the sort of thing that we wish we saw more of in young people’s literature, and Sarah Dooley is exactly the sort of author who needs and deserves this fellowship. It is a startling book, surprising at every turn, and its exploration of poverty, trauma, and loss deserves to be read by as wide an audience as possible.”—Daniel Handler, Lyn Miller-Lachmann, Neal Shusterman, and Susanna Reich, judges for the 2012 PEN/Phyllis Naylor fellowship
★ 02/01/2017
Gr 5–8—Following the death of one of her mothers, Mama Lacy, 12-year-old Fella is ripped from the only other parent she has ever known, Mama Shannon, and her 16-year-old sister, Zoey Grace, aka Zany. Fella is forced to move in with her grandmother Mrs. Madison, who has never approved of the relationship between her daughter, the more serious Mama Lacy, and the free-spirited Mama Shannon. When Zany shows up in the middle of the night, whisking away Fella and Mrs. Madison's stowaway poodle, Haberdashery, they set off on a misadventure of epic proportions. Zany is steadfastly determined that she and Fella return to Asheville, NC, to honor Mama Lacy's dying wish that her ashes be scattered there. In the span of a night, what can go wrong does—the girls lose (and find) the ash-filled urn and accept a ride with a would-be thief, and the dog is hit by a car—but nothing will stop them in their pursuit to tie together the last shreds of their torn-apart family. Many poor decisions are made during the journey, such as taking a ride with a stranger. While searching for the girls, Mama Shannon and Mrs. Madison come to realize they have more in common than they think, and they begin to understand the importance of putting aside their own grief when making family decisions. Dooley makes readers stop and think about what really constitutes a family and whether laws should ultimately define those parameters. VERDICT Poignantly told with verve and a splash of humor, this novel explores sensitive topics with care and belongs in all middle grade collections.—Michele Shaw, Quail Run Elementary School, San Ramon, CA
2017-02-01
Two sisters make an unauthorized expedition to their former hometown and in the process bring together the two parts of their divided family.Dooley packs plenty of emotion into this eventful road trip, which takes place over the course of less than 24 hours. Twelve-year-old Ophelia, nicknamed Fella, and her 16-year-old sister, Zoey Grace, aka Zany, are the daughters of a lesbian couple, Shannon and Lacy, who could not legally marry. The two white girls squabble and share memories as they travel from West Virginia to Asheville, North Carolina, where Zany is determined to scatter Mama Lacy's ashes in accordance with her wishes. The year is 2004, before the Supreme Court decision on gay marriage, and the girls have been separated by hostile, antediluvian custodial laws. Fella's present-tense narration paints pictures not just of the difficulties they face on the trip (a snowstorm, car trouble, and an unlikely thief among them), but also of their lives before Mama Lacy's illness and of the ways that things have changed since then. Breathless and engaging, Fella's distinctive voice is convincingly childlike. The conversations she has with her sister, as well as her insights about their relationship, likewise ring true. While the girls face serious issues, amusing details and the caring adults in their lives keep the tone relatively light. Some readers may feel that the resolution comes a mite too easily, but most will enjoy the journey and be pleased when Fella's family figures out how to come together in a new way. (Historical fiction. 10-14)
