Blizzard’s Wake by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor
July 30, 2006 — Mary Childs
[Minneapolis weather forecast for today and tomorrow? 100 (or more) degrees! Reading suggestion for these temps? Blizzard's Wake!]
Another book from the 2006-07 Maud Hart Lovelace list, Blizzard’s Wake is a great combination of adventure, historical fiction, and characters dealing with personal tragedy. Four years ago Kate Sterling’s mother was killed in a car accident where Zeke Dexter, the driver in the other car, was driving while drunk. Zeke also lived in an old farmhouse near where Kate, her brother Jesse, and her father, Dr. Sterling, lived.
Kate has never really accepted her mother’s death, and her only emotion is absolute hatred of Zeke. Zeke has served his time in prison with good behavior and is now being released one year earlier than the original 5 year sentence. On a mild late winter day in March, Zeke’s homecoming combines with Jesse & Dr. Sterling coming home from a Saturday in town when suddenly the wind blows up what will later be known as the Great Blizzard of 1941. Zeke on foot becomes disoriented by the blinding snow, dirt and wind, and Dr. Sterling and Jesse in their old car without a heater or radio, become stranded in a snowbank, even though they are within sight of their house. And Kate’s alone at home!
So now you can write your own ending or read this exciting story to see how Ms. Naylor combined all these parts to create a great story! What’s going to happen during the blizzard and what will happen after the blizzard–in the Blizzard’s Wake???
As book 3 in his Dark Fusion series, Shusterman uses this distortion of the Ugly Duckling fairy tale to ask the question, “How do you judge beauty?” Cara DeFido was in high school, but so ugly in appearance that she literally caused mirrors and camera lenses to shatter. As you might expect, her appearance impacted her relationships with other kids at school, and even her own family, in a very negative way. But, with the help of Miss Leticia, the strange old “crazy owman of Vista View” cemetary, she realized that even she had a destiny to fulfill, and she began to follow the clues to find that destiny or purpose in life.