Chewy Moon

Chewy Moon by Paige Shelton
(iUniverse.com / 0-595-44431-8 / August 2007 / 90 pages / $9.95)

Reviewed by Dr. Al Past for PODBRAM
 

Josie Abernathy is eleven and lives with her grandmother in a small house in Averine, Georgia. Josie is a tomboy, a devoted baseball player, and afraid to leave the house unless her grandmother goes with her, perhaps because she has lost her parents in an accident years earlier. One night after her grandmother has gone to sleep, she is beckoned outside by a strange, but appealing, girl her own age, oddly named Sanana. The girl is friendly, has some highly unusual powers, and gradually convinces Josie to accompany her on a series of increasingly challenging missions. As the night wears on, Josie confronts her fears, makes new friends, and comes to learn some important lessons about the adult world and her own character.

This slight novel, the author's first, reads smoothly and cleanly. My only quibble is with the cover, which, while quite appropriate to the story, is too subtle to grab the eye of the casual browser.

The back cover bears the words "Juvenile Fiction," (Ages 9-12, according to Amazon) and I agree. I would think the book would most appeal to young people perhaps ten to fifteen. That said, it was an intriguing enough a story as to keep this reader, many times that age, interested all the way to the end.

See Also: Paige Shelton's Website
Dr. Al Past's B&N Review