Books by Patricia MacLachlan and Complete Book Reviews

Patricia MacLachlan, HarperCollins/Tegen, $14.99 (128p) ISBN 978-0-06-027971-4
MacLachlan (Edward's Eyes) delivers a strong, spare novel about the power of writing to transform. When a famous writer visits a fourth-grade classroom, she helps five friends discover how writing can help make sense of their lives. Many of the most
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author Yearling Books $5.99 (132p) ISBN 978-0-440-41145-1
PW described this story of a family that takes in an abandoned baby as ``lean and lyrical,'' adding that the Newbery Medalist ``gracefully entwines past and present.'' All ages. (Sept.)
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author HarperCollins $15.89 (144p) ISBN 978-0-06-024117-9
Minna is technically an excellent cellist, but she wants to find her vibrato. The process of that discovery is almost as elusive as the vibrato itself. As are many of Newbery Medalist MacLachlan's heroines, Minna is serious and questioning, counting
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author Delacorte Press Books for Young Readers $15.95 (144p) ISBN 978-0-385-31133-5
After bidding good-bye to the last of the ``summer people,'' Larkin, her parents and grandmother return home to find a baby in a basket. ``I cannot take care of her now, but I know she will be safe with you. . . . I will come back for her one day. I
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author HarperCollins $15.99 (96p) ISBN 978-0-06-023328-0
The magnificent sequel to MacLachlan's Newbery-winning Sarah, Plain and Tall opens on a joyous note: ``Papa married Sarah on a summer day. There were no clouds in the sky, and Papa picked Sarah up in his arms and whirled her around and around, her...
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author Joanna Cotler Books $14.99 (80p) ISBN 978-0-06-027558-7
Cassie, the imaginative eight-year-old daughter of Sarah (from Sarah, Plain and Tall), narrates the fourth tale in the series, More Perfect than the Moon by Patricia MacLachlan. The girl writes her observations on prairie life (which she twists into
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Patricia MacLachlan. HarperCollins/Tegen, $15.99 (128p) ISBN 978-0-06-052297-1
With her signature spare precision, MacLachlan (Word After Word After Word) crafts a standout portrait of a child-grandparent relationship, set on a family farm. “Billy is eighty-eight years old, and I don’t worry about him dying,” says 10-year-old...
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Patricia MacLachlan. S&S/McElderry, $15.99 (128p) ISBN 978-1-4424-2171-4
MacLachlan crafts an elegantly spare novel about the healing power of dogs and love—much as she did in 2011’s Waiting for the Magic, though this story sticks to realism, forgoing the talking animals of that book. Narrator Zoe Cassidy and her 10-year-
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Patricia MacLachlan. HarperCollins/Tegen, $16.99 (128p) ISBN 978-0-06-199859-1
A boy discovers newfound courage and an old family secret during an eventful summer stay with his beloved grandmother in Newbery Medalist MacLachlan’s brief but emotionally intense novel. Robbie can’t wait to visit his grandmother Maddy, who will...
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Patricia MacLachlan. S&S/McElderry, $15.99 (128p) ISBN 978-1-4424-6008-9
As she did in recent younger middle-grade titles including The Truth of Me and Kindred Souls, MacLachlan again demonstrates a gift for combining an economy of prose with a bounty of emotion. Lucy’s family is traveling by VW bus to visit her...
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Patricia MacLachlan. HarperCollins/Tegen, $14.99 (112p) ISBN 978-0-06-229262-9
Newbery Medalist MacLachlan creates a spare, moving tale told from the perspective of Teddy, the dog of the title. Teddy can speak, but only poets and children can understand him, so Teddy isn’t surprised when both Nicholas (Nickel) and his younger...
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Patricia MacLachlan. S&S/McElderry, $15.99 (128p) ISBN 978-1-4814-7252-4
In a characteristically subtle novel set in rural Wyoming, MacLachlan intertwines past and present as she explores the truest meaning of family, home, and fulfillment. Ten-year-old Sylvie Bloom’s mother, a soprano who once performed in grand...
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author . Atheneum $15.99 (116p) ISBN 978-1-4169-2743-3
From the start, it is clear that Edward is very special. The day his delightfully eccentric parents bring him home from the hospital, his mother places him in the arms of older brother and narrator Jake, who is immediately smitten: “His eyes...
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author . HarperCollins/ Cotler $14.99 (84p) ISBN 978-0-06-027560-0
MacLachlan's poignant fifth novel in the cycle that began with Sarah, Plain and Tall brings to a close the story of the mail-order bride from Maine. Now deeply ensconced in her prairie home, Sarah helps Anna to plan a wedding of her own, an...
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author , illus. by Amanda Shepherd. HarperCollins/Cotler $14.99 (40p) ISBN 978-0-06-027976-9
As moonlight dapples her bed, a girl finds herself in a contemplative mood. "Who loves me?" she wonders. Fortunately, wise counsel is close at hand: her talking marmalade tabby. Family members and friends love her, the cat reassures her, and
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Patricia MacLachlan. HarperCollins/Tegen, $15.99 (144p) ISBN 978-0-06-268769-2
Key relationships in her own life inspired this characteristically taut and resonant novel by Newbery Medalist MacLachlan (Sarah, Plain and Tall). Life as Fiona has known and loved it comes to a screeching halt over runny eggs one morning when Fiona’
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author . HarperCollins/Cotler $14.95 (128p) ISBN 978-0-06-023605-2
Taking over the reins from his sister Anna, who narrated Sarah, Plain and Tall and Skylark, Caleb describes the event in this heartwarming third installment, in which Jacob is reunited with his father. As the novel opens, readers meet Cassie, the...
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author, Emily MacLachlan, Author, Katy Schneider, Illustrator , illus. by Kate Schneider. HarperCollins/Cotler $15.99 (40p) ISBN 978-0-06-029798-5
This elegantly conceived picture book explores an artist's process through the eyes of a boy living year-round on an island that attracts painters in the summers. "I paint all winter long. And I wait," the boy narrator begins. Schneider,
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Patricia MacLachlan and Emily MacLachlan Charest, illus. by Barry Moser. HarperCollins/Tegen, $17.99 (32p) ISBN 978-0-06-027978-3
This collection of 13 handsomely illustrated free-verse poems makes an eclectic and engaging feline companion to MacLachlan and Charest’s Once I Ate a Pie and I Didn’t Do It. Speaking in a delightful range of voices, the cats each share their...
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Elizabeth Zunon. Candlewick, $16.99 (32p) ISBN 978-0-7636-4747-6
“Lala salama” means “Sleep peacefully” in Swahili; MacLachlan (Before You Came) imagines the phrase repeated by a Tanzanian mother as she recounts the events of the day to her small child. In all of Zunon’s (My Hands Sing the Blues) warm, intimate...
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Micha Archer. S&S/McElderry, $17.99 (40p) ISBN 978-1-4424-4191-0
Elaborate sun-filled spreads by Archer (Daniel’s Good Day) illuminate Newbery Medalist MacLachlan’s farm-life memories in this dazzling picture book. The writer’s childhood recollections unspool informally, fondly, as if being recalled for family...
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Stephanie Graegin. Little, Brown, $17 (40p) ISBN 978-0-316-18533-2
Let’s hear it for the privileges of birth order! Because as this book reminds all the Numero Unos out there, “One day there may be a second—or a third—to sleep in the basket with the yellow ribbon wound round. But you will always be the first.”...
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Bryan Collier. Simon & Schuster, $16.99 (32p) ISBN 978-1-4169-7950-0
Collier's crisp, complex illustrations add light to Newbery Award–winner MacLachlan's open letter to a grandchild who lives in Africa. The child's visits are rare, and his sunny surroundings contrast with her cold winters. MacLachlan rehearses facts
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author, Brian Floca, Illustrator , illus. by Brian Floca. S&S/Atheneum $12.99 (81p) ISBN 978-1-4169-9081-9
In this sweetly engaging chapter book, two siblings visit their grandparents' farm for Christmas. Liam, an especially sensitive bibliophile (he takes 37 books along), notices “White Cow” standing all alone in their field and worries
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Hadley Hooper. Roaring Brook/Porter, $17.99 (40p) ISBN 978-1-59643-948-1
In one long, singing sentence (and a briefer second one that’s no less lyrical), MacLachlan (Snowflakes Fall) takes what’s known of Matisse’s upbringing and shows how naturally it leads into a life as an artist. “If you were a boy named Henri...
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Jarrett J. Krosoczka. HarperCollins/Tegen, $17.99 (32p) ISBN 978-0-06-239864-2
A farmer and his family have 12 beloved chickens, among them seven hens named Joyce. The whole group listens avidly during readaloud time, and the hens “sometimes sat on the porch chairs and looked out over the meadow like elegant ladies.” Then a...
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Tomie dePaola. S&S/McElderry, $17.99 (32p) ISBN 978-1-4814-2062-4
It’s nearly time for the moon to rise, and all of nature knows what that means. “The moon’s almost here./ Mama duck drifts to shore,” writes Newbery Medalist MacLachlan in lullaby-like verse. “Ducklings swim after:/ One, two, three, and four.” On...
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Patricia MacLachlan and Emily MacLachlan Charest, illus. by Matt Phelan. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $17.99 (40p) ISBN 978-0-544-44280-1
Little Robot has a head made from a toaster with a lightbulb stuck in it, a rotund body with riveted orange pants, and tractor treads for feet. He leads an idyllic life in a cottage by the pond, and he’s developed satisfying little rituals to fill...
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Patricia MacLachlan and Emily MacLachlan Charest, illus. by David Diaz, HarperCollins/Tegen, $16.99 (32p) ISBN 978-0-06-051234-7
Iridescent light, tropical colors, and entwined, nature-themed patterns distinguish Caldecott Medalist Diaz's (Smoky Night) lavish art, which is the bedrock of this resplendent book. Suggestive of the subjects of some of Picasso's figurative...
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Patricia MacLachlan and Emily MacLachlan Charest, illus. by Katy Schneider, HarperCollins/Tegen, $16.99 (32p) ISBN 978-0-06-135833-3
Whoooooooo's a good doggie? In this follow-up to Once I Ate a Pie (2006), the soulful-eyed canine poets certainly believe they are. The narrator of one poem declares: "I'm perfect./ I know because they tell me so," which mitigates the fact that "I...
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author, Emily MacLachlan Charest, Author, Amanda Shepherd, Illustrator , illus. by Amanda Shepherd. HarperCollins/Cotler $15.99 (32p) ISBN 978-0-06-057031-6
Awakened by moonlight streaming through the window, young Fiona slips out of her covers and into her backyard. “The night wraps around her like a velvet coat,” gently declare the co-authors (Charest is the Newbery Medalist’s...
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Marc Boutavant. Chronicle, $14.99 (56p) ISBN 978-1-4521-1182-7
Forget about every dog having its day: floppy-eared Barkus owns the entire calendar in this upbeat collection of five stories that bridges picture book and chapter book terrain. Barkus is the “smartest dog in the whole world,” according to...
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author, Milo Ventimiglia, Read by , read by Milo Ventimiglia. S&S Audio $17.99 (0p) ISBN 978-0-7435-6911-8
Ventimiglia's soft voice and smooth delivery capture all the notes of fun, sadness and eventually, emergent hope that fill MacLachlan's novel about the powerful bonds of a family's love. Through the flashback memories of Jake,...
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author, Mike Wimmer, Illustrator, Michael Wimmer, Illustrator HarperCollins $17.99 (32p) ISBN 978-0-06-021098-4
MacLachlan's characteristically resonant language and Wimmer's majestic paintings affectingly celebrate the natural world and the family. Told in the voice of a child who lives on a farm with his parents and grandparents, the author's poetic...
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Steven Kellogg. Random, $17.99 (32p) ISBN 978-0-385-37693-8
In tribute to the lives lost in the 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, acclaimed author and artist MacLachlan and Kellogg collaborate on a book that celebrates “the laughter, the playful high spirits, and the uniqueness of the children...
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Amy June Bates. S&S/Atheneum, $15.99 (160p) ISBN 978-1-4169-2745-7
Newbery Medalist MacLachlan tackles the familiar yet always heart-wrenching subject of parental separation in her venerable spare and moving style. "It was early on a Saturday summer morning when my mother and father stopped arguing and Papa walked...
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author, Maria Pia Marrella, Illustrator HarperTrophy $4.99 (56p) ISBN 978-0-06-440231-6
A stay at their aunt and uncle's home means changes for Emma and Zach, but mutual affection brings them closer together, in this story by the Newbery Medalist. A Charlotte Zolotow Book. Ages 7-10. (July)
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author, Lloyd Bloom, Illustrator HarperTrophy $5.99 (117p) ISBN 978-0-06-440288-0
The Newbery Medal-winning author's first book tells of a boy's spending the summer away from home, and how he learns to look at the world in different ways. Ages 8-11. (Feb.)
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author, Alexander Pertzoff, Illustrator, Alexander Pertzoff, Photographer HarperCollins $6.99 (32p) ISBN 978-0-06-443360-0
Recalling his days as a student in a one-room prairie schoolhouse, Great-grandfather reminisces about his beloved dog Three Names. Ages 5-9. (May)
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author, Alexander Pertzoff, Illustrator, Alexander Pertzoff, Photographer HarperCollins Publishers $14.95 (31p) ISBN 978-0-06-024035-6
With graceful language and an uncommon depth of understanding MacLachlan ( Sarah, Plain and Tall ) offers readers a nostalgic view of rural Midwestern life at the turn of the century--a time ``when Great-grandfather was young, and summer was fine,...
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author, Barry Moser, Illustrator Delacorte Press Books for Young Readers $14.95 (96p) ISBN 978-0-385-30427-6
Like Sarah, Plain and Tall , for which MacLachlan won the 1986 Newbery Award, this novel concerns a family trying to fill the gaping void left by the loss of a mother. And like that earlier masterpiece, this is a spellbinding tale, lean only in its...
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author, Barry Moser, Illustrator, Barry Moser, Photographer HarperCollins $16.99 (32p) ISBN 978-0-06-024413-2
Newbery Medalist MacLachlan's minimal, deeply resonant text centers on a girl whose parents have sold their farm on the prairie-clearly not by choice. As she anticipates all that she will miss and devises plots to avoid moving (""Or maybe/ I'll live
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Kathryn Brown. Candlewick, $15.99 (40p) ISBN 978-0-7636-4753-7
Newbery Medalist MacLachlan (Sarah, Plain and Tall) revisits the prairie in this tender story of a family that emigrates from Russia to the American frontier. Though Nora’s parents are aware of their daughter’s sense of isolation on her new turf,...
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author, Dan Yaccarino, Illustrator , illus. by Dan Yaccarino. HarperCollins/Cotler $15.99 (40p) ISBN 978-0-06-000961-8
Two mistrustful pets grow to love a new baby in this amiable story, pictured from a dog and cat's close-to-the-floor vantage point. Nigel, a fawn-colored tabby, and Julia, a spotted hound, call the interloper "Bittle" because "She'
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Chris Sheban. Roaring Brook/Porter, $16.99 (32p) ISBN 978-1-62672-334-4
Newbery Medalist MacLachlan’s incantatory picture book memoir draws readers in from its first words: “If you were a little girl/ who listened to stories/ over and over/ and over...” Using delicate shading and pale hues, Sheban (What to Do with a Box)
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Patricia MacLachlan, Author, Jane Dyer, Illustrator Doubleday Books for Young Readers $12.95 (32p) ISBN 978-0-385-32150-1
Watercolor illustrations by Jane Dyer lend a new look to Patricia MacLachlan's The Sick Day, originally published in 1979. Restful and happy scenes of Emily's father caring for her while she's under the weather play up the gentle humor and ...
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Patricia MacLachlan. Albert Whitman, $16.99 (144p) ISBN 978-0-8075-6616-9
For readers who wondered over the past seven decades what happened to the parents of Gertrude Chandler Warner’s Boxcar Children, Newbery Medalist MacLachan supplies the answer in this partially satisfying prequel. Henry, Jessie, Violet, and Benny...
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Patricia MacLachlan. McElderry, $16.99 (128p) ISBN 978-1-5344-2959-8
Newbery Medalist MacLachlan again concisely and authentically conveys character and emotion in this novel about two siblings spending the summer on their grandparents’ Deer Island farm. When redheaded Louisa, almost 12 and a “secret writer,”...
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Emilia Dzubiak. HarperCollins/Tegen, $15.99 (96p) ISBN 978-0-06-294098-8
A charmed (and charming) dog, a language-loving girl, and an innate aunt-niece bond are among the alluring threads that MacLachlan (Dream Within a Dream) deftly weaves into this taut novel. Seven-year-old Grace’s aunt Lily, a writer frustrated by...
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Patricia MacLachlan. HarperCollins/Tegen, $16.99 (160p) ISBN 978-0-06-288585-2
When deeply bonded twins Ben and Nora accidentally discover, through a DNA sample test their mother orders as a subject for her newspaper column, that their beloved younger sister Birdy is Swedish—not Irish, like their mother, or Italian, like their
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Daniel Miyares. HarperCollins/Tegen, $16.99 (128p) ISBN 978-0-06-311601-6
An only child until the age of nine, Jacob Black views his solitary baby picture on the living room wall as “lonely” and wishes for a litter of puppies, like his friend Bella has. Instead, he gets a “litter of Trips,” as he affectionately calls his...
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Patricia MacLachlan. McElderry, $16.99 (144p) ISBN 978-1-53449-994-2
The late Newbery Medalist blends themes of baseball and painting with loving family and friends in this slim work—her final novel—about the daughter of a minor-league pitcher and a painter seeking courage and her own path to pursuing her dreams....
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Micha Archer. McElderry, $18.99 (40p) ISBN 978-1-5344-7355-3
Evocative artwork and gentle prose from the creators of Prairie Days distinguish this intergenerational tale about a community that celebrates the last night of the year with sleigh rides for young and old. Tim and Tom, the black Percheron horses...
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Kenard Pak. HarperCollins/Tegen, $17.99 (48p) ISBN 978-0-06-268773-9
In meditative prose, Newbery-winner MacLachlan commemorates the life of a great barn. Pak (Cat Wishes) pictures the initially youthful narrator in a bright red cap and suspenders (“I was only five years old”) watching as the barn is raised by...
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Francesca Sanna. Chronicle, $17.99 (44p) ISBN 978-0-8118-7910-1
In this tender picture book, an anthropomorphized Earth, portrayed as a cherubic brown-skinned giant with long hair, makes her way through the seasons. After waking from a wintertime snooze, “My friend Earth” carries out various duties: nurturing...
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Jen Hill. HarperCollins/Tegen, $17.99 (32p) ISBN 978-0-06297-114-2
In this dreamy introduction to the art and craft of writing, late Newbery Medalist MacLachlan follows fair-haired child Lucy and her summertime neighbor, a gray-haired older woman—“my poet”—through a seaside town and environs as Lucy, her own...
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Patricia MacLachlan, illus. by Chris Sheban. Holiday House/Porter, $18.99 (32p) ISBN 978-0-8234-4489-2
In this elegiac story about love and loss, a youngest grandchild becomes his grandfather’s eyes when the older man begins to lose his sight. Milo is “not a talker,” explains his older sister Emma, who narrates, but he pays attention when Grandpa...
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ARTICLES
  • Children's Bookshelf Talks with Patricia MacLachlan
  • Sarah, for the Very Last Time
  • Q & A with Patricia MacLachlan
  • Q & A with Patricia MacLachlan
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