Just Under the Clouds

by Melissa Sarno Narrated by Monika Felice Smith

Overview

Can you still have a home if you don't have a house? In the spirit of The Truth About Jellyfish and Fish in a Tree comes a stunning debut about a family struggling to find something lasting when everything feels so fleeting.

Always think in threes and you'll never fall, Cora's father told her when she was a little girl. Two feet, one hand. Two hands, one foot. That was all Cora needed to know to climb the trees of Brooklyn.

But now Cora is a middle schooler, a big sister, and homeless. Her mother is trying to hold the family together after her father's death, and Cora must look after her sister, Adare, who's just different, their mother insists. Quick to smile, Adare hates wearing shoes, rarely speaks, and appears untroubled by the question Cora can't help but ask: How will she find a place to call home?

After their room at the shelter is ransacked, Cora's mother looks to an old friend for help, and Cora finally finds what she has been looking for: Ailanthus altissima, the "tree of heaven," which can grow in even the worst conditions. It sets her on a path to discover a deeper truth about where she really belongs.

Just Under the Clouds will take root in your heart and blossom long after you've turned the last page.

"[A] heartbreaking yet hopeful story of a family searching for a place to belong." --Publishers Weekly

"[A] thought provoking debut about the meaning of home and the importance of family."--Horn Book Magazine

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

"[R]ich and evocative . . . . A moving book about an all-too-common childhood experience, which is fairly uncommon in children's literature." —Booklist

"Troubling, affecting, and ultimately uplifting, from a promising debut novelist."—Kirkus Reviews

"[A] thought provoking debut about the meaning of home and the importance of family."—Horn Book Magazine

"This is a beautiful book. I loved Cora who was so warm and real. I cried over her hard life, but was thrilled over her choices. I wanted her to succeed; I wanted her to be happy. The ending of this book was wonderful; I'll never forget it." -Patricia Reilly Giff, author of Eleven

"This beautiful novel grabbed me from page one and never let go. Simply put, I loved this book. Cora and Adare wormed their way into my heart. I rooted for them, I ached for them. An incredible debut novel. I'm already a Sarno fan and can't wait to see what she does next." -Susin Nielsen, author of We Are All Made of Molecules

Kirkus Reviews

2018-03-04
Life is not going well for Cora.Ever since her Irish-immigrant father died six years ago, the 12-year-old, her Mexican-American mom, and her younger sister, Adare, who was "born special" and speaks little, have been living in a series of temporary homes—and now they're in a grim Brooklyn shelter. Through it all Cora has persevered, getting her sister to and from school and charting (and climbing) the trees around where she's lived, keeping up her father's horticultural work. But she's struggling in math, bullied, friendless, and, after their shelter room is ransacked, homeless. After her mom's friend Willa takes them in, Cora begins to imagine a more stable life—but living with Willa would take away what little autonomy her mom still has. Cora makes friends with a classmate who lives on a houseboat, rootless but not homeless, and each uses this friendship as a path to a more satisfying life. Cora's first-person narrative voice occasionally strays away from age-appropriate but never enough to diminish her poignant—even desperate—situation, as she strives to provide what Adare needs while chasing her own limited dreams. Even after they move into a "placement," a gritty complex that's too dangerous—"somewhere you can't go after school on your own"—to be a home, challenges realistically persist.Troubling, affecting, and ultimately uplifting, from a promising debut novelist. (Fiction. 10-14)

Product Details

BN ID:	2940171879419
Publisher:	Penguin Random House
Publication date:	06/05/2018
Edition description:	Unabridged
Age Range:	8 - 12 Years

Read an Excerpt

Mom’s calling and I’m counting. My backpack’s tight on my back up here in the tree. Knees tucked neat over the branches. Bare feet dangling. One . . . two . . . three . . . I soar. Out and then down and I’m at the dirt, balancing on the tree’s roots, while Adare spreads out on a clump of Brooklyn brown grass, like a snow angel without the snow.
(Continues…)

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Excerpted from "Just Under the Clouds"
by .
Copyright © 2018 Melissa Sarno.
Excerpted by permission of Random House Children's Books.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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