Defiance

by Valerie Hobbs

Overview

Eleven-year-old Toby Steiner wants to do normal things on his vacation. He wants to hike and race his bike down the hill. He wants to learn to fish out on the lake. He doesn't want to return to the children's hospital where his painful cancer treatment finally ended. When Toby starts spending time with Pearl, a spunky old woman who lives on a nearby farm, and Blossom, her broken-down cow, he sees all the more reason to keep the new lump on his side a secret from his parents. From Pearl he discovers the beauty of poetry, and from Blossom he just might uncover the meaning of life.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780312535810
Publisher:	Square Fish
Publication date:	05/26/2009
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	144
Product dimensions:	5.10(w) x 7.50(h) x 0.50(d)
Lexile:	640L (what's this?)
Age Range:	10 - 13 Years

About the Author

Valerie Hobbs is the recipient of the 1999 PEN/Norma Klein Award, a biennial prize that recognizes "an emerging voice of literary merit among American writers of children's fiction." She is the author of young adult and middle-grade novels including Sheep, Anything but Ordinary, and The Last Best Days of Summer. She holds a B.A. and an M.A. in English from the University of California at Santa Barbara, where she has taught academic writing. Valerie lives in Santa Barbara, California, with her husband.

Read an Excerpt

Defiance

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By Hobbs, Valerie

Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)

Copyright © 2005 Hobbs, Valerie
All right reserved.
ISBN: 0374308470

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From Defiance

On the third morning after they'd settled into the cabin, Toby had felt it again. It was in the same spot on his right side, a slippery marble. He'd jumped out of bed and hurried into his clothes, covering it up.
His mom had been standing at the little kitchen sink sipping her coffee. There were purple shadows under her eyes. "Sleep all right, honey?"
"Sure."
She looked out the window. "It's going to be hot today. Did you pack your trunks?"
"My trunks?" Was he hearing right? The lake was off-limits, wasn't it?
"I thought you could help me for a while in the garden," she said. "Then we could . . . Oh, I don't know . . ." Her smile was lopsided, as if she was out of practice. "Run through the sprinkler to cool off! Or are you too old for that?"
"I'm eleven, Mom," he said. "Jeez!" Run through the sprinkler? Was she nuts? And anyway, he did have his trunks. He just couldn't wear them. Or she would see. Her eagle eyes would go straight to the marble and he would be back at Children's Hospital in no time flat. She would call an ambulance. Or get a helicopter. Only he wasn't going to do all that again. He wasn't going to puke up his guts over and over while his mother heldhis head. He wasn't going to miss school and lose what few friends he had left. He wasn't going to make new friends with kids who disappeared. It would be the biggest lie he'd ever told, and he would tell it over and over again whenever she asked him how he was, no matter how bad it made him feel.
"Fine," he'd tell her. "I'm fine."

Continues...

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Excerpted from Defiance by Hobbs, Valerie Copyright © 2005 by Hobbs, Valerie. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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Editorial Reviews

Real and poignant.” —Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review

“Beautiful and gripping . . . The victory of the human spirit shines through Defiance like the sun.” —Suzanne Fisher Staples, Newbery Honor–winning author of Shabanu

“Emotionally satisfying. Hobbs, a gifted writer, does a quietly effective job of dramatizing the life-affirming power of both poetry and a cross-generational friendship.” —Booklist

“The wit and wisdom of poetry give this potentially sentimental plot depth and a welcome acidity. Hobb's dry humor is deliciously evident in Pearl's ironic take on things.” —The Horn Book

“A poetic tale of empowerment with gentle touches of humor.” —School Library Journal

“This simple, touching story offers great characterization.” —Voice of Youth Advocates

“This gripping story will send fans searching for this author's previous books.” —SIGNAL Journal

“A heartwarming story of self-discovery.” —A YALSA Teen YA Galley Reader

From the Publisher

Gr 5-7-After finally finishing his painful cancer treatment, Toby Steiner, 11, is spending the summer in a rented cabin with his overprotective mother and weekender dad. Determined not to go back into therapy, he hides from his parents the lump he's discovered on his side. Exploring the countryside on an old bike, he encounters a skinny old cow and its owner, an almost-blind woman whose motto, "Whoever steals my freedom takes my life," represents her own defiance over attempts to usurp her independence. Embittered by life, Pearl Rhodes Richardson, 94, is a celebrated poet who has vowed never to write again. She and Toby develop a friendship and find common ground in their resistance to their families' interference in their lives. He helps with chores and reads poetry to her, and the two care for the failing cow whose inevitable death becomes a metaphor for what must be accepted and for what it is not yet time. Defiance turns to decision as each one helps the other face a difficult but hopeful future. An afterword, set several years later, provides a triumphant conclusion for both Toby's and Pearl's stories. Spare, graceful writing, with just enough detail to bring the characters and setting to life, skillfully paces the action and keeps the focus on Toby's conflicted feelings, ultimately celebrating the source of strength he and Pearl become to one another. A quiet, yet resonant story.-Marie Orlando, Suffolk Cooperative Library System, Bellport, NY Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

School Library Journal

Toby Steiner, age 11, doesn't want to go back to the cancer hospital. He doesn't want to "puke up his guts" or "make . . . friends with kids who disappeared." So he's not going to tell anyone about the hard marble-sized lump that just reappeared in his side. Instead, while on a country vacation, he's going to ride a bike, view the heavens through his telescope and enjoy being a regular kid. What happens in this stirring evocative tale is that Toby strikes up an unlikely acquaintanceship with an elderly lady who lives nearby, a once famous poet who has been "losing her vision" both physically and metaphorically. Hobbs manages to wring genuine emotion from the reader despite a somewhat pat ending. The feisty, life-affirming, lesson-teaching elder is a familiar character in children's literature, but Hobbs breathes new life into the situation, giving the character some problems of her own and making the intersection of these two souls both real and poignant. (Fiction. 10+)

Kirkus Reviews