All Four Quarters of the Moon
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
For fans of When You Trap a Tiger and A Place to Belong comes a gentle, “touching” (Booklist, starred review) middle grade novel about love and resilience, interwoven with Chinese mythology, a Little World made completely of paper, and the ever-changing, but constant moon.
The night of the Mid-Autumn Festival, making mooncakes with Ah-Ma, was the last time Peijing Guo remembers her life being the same. She is haunted by the magical image of a whole egg yolk suspended in the middle like the full moon. Now adapting to their new life in Australia, Peijing thinks everything is going to turn out okay as long as they all have each other, but cracks are starting to appear in the family.
Five-year-old Biju, lovable but annoying, needs Peijing to be the dependable big sister. Ah-Ma keeps forgetting who she is; Ma Ma is no longer herself and Ba Ba must adjust to a new role as a hands-on dad. Peijing has no idea how she is supposed to cope with the uncertainties of her own world while shouldering the burden of everyone else.
If her family are the four quarters of the mooncake, where does she even fit in?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
An 11-year-old moving from Singapore to Australia finds normalcy in sisterhood within Marr's (A Glasshouse of Stars) lyrical, Chinese-folktale-twined novel. Finding "the people and the atmosphere and the trees and the space" wildly different in her new home, and trying to fit in at school, Peijing Guo longs for the assurance of established friendships and celebrating the Mid-Autumn Festival with homemade mooncakes, an enduring family custom. Her traditional family is having no easier time adjusting: Ma Ma seldom leaves the house, Ba Ba must take on solo parenting, Ah Ma's failing memory causes concern, and five-year-old Biju depends on her sister now more than ever. Amid these adjustments and others, Peijing and Biju's Little World—a miniature crafted universe of paper animals, natural elements, and a red barn in an instant-noodle box—provides comfort and a physical opportunity for them to rebuild. Gentle, observational prose carries the novel's intentionally paced events, folk tale references, organic character growth, and a heartening message of embracing change and impermanence. Ages 8–12.
