Earthshine

Twelve-year-old Slim and 11-year-old Isaiah have the same problem: both have a parent with AIDS. Isaiah believes that they could be cured by the Miracle Man in the ``Hungry Valley'' north of Los Angeles. Slim, on the other hand, doubts that there is any way to save her kind-hearted actor father, Mack. Through Slim's honest and sometimes sassy first-person narration, Nelson (The Beggars' Ride) tenderly portrays a daughter's confusion and anger at her parent's decline. The story is paced in such a way as to allow the reader to share in, rather than be bombarded by, heart-breaking moments: Slim wishes Larry, her father's lover, were sick instead of Mack, and is then overwhelmed with remorse; Slim conceals her father's illness from her mother, who is remarried and lives in another state, for fear of being forced to leave his side. Nelson captures less dramatic episodes with equal poignancy, describing, for example, Mack's generous spirit toward the man who beats him out for an important acting role, in part because Mack looks sick, or Mack's efforts to eat the meals Larry devotedly prepares. An eventual pilgrimage to the Hungry Valley does not defeat the disease, but does yields surprising-and convincing-affirmations of life itself. Ages 11-14. (Oct.)