title: The Truth About Sparrows (Booklist Editor's Choice. Books for Youth (Awards))
author:  Marian Hale 
description: Grade 5-7Sadie's father is a terrific mechanic and a creative carpenter who can do just about anything except make a living in Dust Bowl Missouri. Resentful about leaving her home, her friend Wilma, and the beautiful table he made that eventually was to have been hers, the 12-year-old is further angered when strangers stare at her dad's polio-withered legs. Relocating to coastal Texas where the fishing industry offers opportunity, the family obtains a one-room tar-paper shack. Promised letters from Wilma fail to arrive, a homeless man living in a cardboard box disappears, and a snobbish town girl constantly humiliates Sadie, causing her to snap when the overly talkative Dollie, with whom she has a budding friendship, tries to console her. The loss of this relationship and a crisis involving the newborn sister Sadie helps deliver cause her to reevaluate what is important. Notwithstanding the myriad challenges to survival, this story has a positive tone. Sadie's father may be down, but he is far from out. Her mom may be keeping house in a tent, but she does so efficiently while cheerfully reminding Sadie that "who you are inside always shows." Best of all, there are true friends willing to be supportive, if only the protagonist would see through her unhappiness. While Zilpha Keatley Snyder's <i>Cat Running</i> (Delacorte, 1994) views the Great Depression through the eyes of the merchant class, Hale highlights the working poor. Rich with social history, this first novel is informative, enjoyable, and evocative.<i>Cindy Darling Codell, Clark Middle School, Winchester, KY</i> <br />Copyright  Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
zlib_text: A Dangerous Debut
  
    
  
  > > Ladies of Mayfair
  
    
  
  > ~ Book Five ~
  
    
  
  Wendy May Andrews
  
    
  
  ∞∞∞
  
    
  
   **Sparrow Ink**
  
  [www.sparrowdeck.com](https://www.sparrowdeck.com/sparrow-ink)
  
  Copyright © 2018 Wendy May Andrews
  
    
  
  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced,
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  permission of the author except for the use of brief quotations in a book
  review.
  
    
  
  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a
  product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons,
  events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
  
    
  
  ISBN - 978-1-7750069-2-3
  
    
  
  Cover Design by German Creative
  
    
  
  www.wendymayandrews.com
  
    
  
  Dedication
  
   _For my entire family, even the ones who don’t read my books._
  
   _Mum and Dad, you are the best cheering section any girl could ask for._
  
   _Andrew, the love of my life, you are the best!_
  
   _And for all my readers._
  
   _Thank you fo