Dizzy

✍ Scribed by Cassidy, Cathy

• Book ID: 106888260
• Publisher: PUFFIN
• Year: 2005
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 204 KB
• Category: Fiction
• ISBN-13: 9780142404744

✦ Synopsis

From School Library Journal

Grade 5-8–When 12-year-old Dizzy is kidnapped by her hippie mother, whom she hasn't seen or heard from in eight years, she thinks that flighty Storm has her father's approval to take her to a solstice festival in Scotland where he will join them. As the weeks go by, Dizzy increasingly dislikes sleeping in a teepee, eating moldy bread, going without hot water, singing for handouts in town, and narrowly escaping arrest. Storm shoves her off on her friend Tess, and Dizzy realizes that Storm isn't the mother she had been wishing for. Dizzy and Tess's son bond and look after the neglected son of Storm's boyfriend. Readers will empathize with the protagonist as she fears that her father has abandoned her, and it takes a serious accident to right things. The eclectic characters and their lifestyle are presented as captivating yet questionable in the girl's first-person narrative, and the well-developed plot fosters concern for Dizzy from the beginning. A unique, satisfying story._–Jean Gaffney, Dayton and Montgomery County Public Library, Miamisburg, OH_
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From

Gr. 7-9. Birthdays are special for Dizzy because they are the only day each year that she hears from her hippy, carefree mother, who abandoned Dizzy and her father when Dizzy was four. On her twelfth birthday, though, her mother, "Storm," unexpectedly shows up in person, wanting to take Dizzy to a solstice festival. Though her mother's bohemian lifestyle is fun, Dizzy increasingly realizes that Storm isn't the person she wants her to be. The diarylike, first-person, present-tense narrative details Dizzy's experiences, complex feelings, and growth as she learns to appreciate the importance of adult care and trust. With strong supporting characters--among them, 14-year-old Finn, who becomes a friend and more, and troubled seven-year-old Mouse, whom Dizzy comes to care for as a brother--this engaging first novel, set in England and Scotland, will attract kids with its likeable, sympathetic protagonist, whose life illustrates the challenges and rewards of adolescence, family, and love. Shelle Rosenfeld
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved