HealthyBooks will continue to be online and available to users, although not updated. Read more…
Eggs ISBN: 9781846166990
Spinelli, Jerry
Published by Orchard, 2007
An Easter egg hunt begins this story, and there are eggs of one sort or another throughout, but it is the odd mismatched friendship of two damaged children that is at the heart of this strange but rivetting novel. Nine year old David's mother has died in a freak accident the year before the story begins, and he has decided that if he obeys all rules and laws to the letter, she will return some day, and together they will watch the sun rise as she had promised. Thirteen year old Primrose, street-wise and stroppy, has never known her father and sleeps in a 1977 Dodge van parked next to the tiny house in which her fey, fortune-teller mother lives. The way these two children get together, their nocturnal adventures and their difficult, spiky relationship makes up the bulk of the story. David lives with his grandmother and his father, who is only home at weekends, and his gran, who loves him dearly, doesn't know how to handle the sullen child who clearly hates her because she is not his mother. The death of the mother is a constant theme, and we gradually learn all about David's emotional inner life and his difficulty in acceptance. The ending is satisfying for both children, but one feels Primrose's life story is certainly going to continue to be unusual. A remarkable novel.
Age: 10+