The Cave

This slow-paced, laborious novel set during the Depression lacks the verve of Karr's (Gideon and the Mummy Professor) previous work. Overwhelmed by the drought and dust storms that have jeopardized her family's South Dakota farm and left her father perpetually angry and hopeless, 12-year-old Christine by chance discovers a hidden cave, ``the most wondrous cave imaginable. With... the sound, the feeling of water.'' The cave provides a secret refuge for Christine and her asthmatic young brother, both troubled by the daily frustrations of their impoverished home, where their martyrlike mother wearily defers to their embittered father. But when he comes across some crystals that Christine and her brother have removed from the cave and trades them for food and supplies, his outlook improves. Christine must decide whether to help him sell more of them, or to preserve the cave's beauty by keeping its location a secret. The author conveys the gravity of Christine's decision by a convoluted biblical reference: as Christine eats some molasses purchased with the crystals, Karr writes that it ``tasted the same as she figured that gall tasted the Wicked had forced at Jesus on the cross.'' In the end, a severe storm seals up the entrance-an anticlimactic finish to an uneventful story. Ages 10-up. (Sept.)