Almost Paradise

  • Type: Books
  • By: Corabel Shofner
  • Age Category: Children
  • Genre: General Fiction
  • Recommended by: Tom S.
  • ISBN/UPC: 9780374303785
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A lonely girl, a clever pig, and building a family piece by piece

Ruby Clyde, a 12-year-old tomboy with a keen instinct for survival, takes an unwilling road trip with Barbara, her feckless mother, and Catfish, Mom’s bad-news boyfriend.   Things go from bad to worse until the so-called adults wind up in jail and Ruby finds herself in the care of her estranged aunt Eleanor, a cranky Episcopalian nun living in a loose religious community based in a Texas peach orchard.
 
Though the story comes across as lighthearted due to Ruby’s breezy narration and a full cast of colorful characters, it deals with such weighty issues as family dysfunction, loneliness and longing, violent crime, chronic illness, and the peculiar nature of love itself.  
 

 

Consider this as your next book if you enjoyed Three Times Lucky by Sheila Turnage, Dear Hank Williams by Kimberly Willis Holt, or Newsgirl by Liza Ketchum.