The Key to Every Thing
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5.0 • 1 Rating
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
For eleven-year-old Tash, Cap’n Jackie isn’t just the elderly next-door neighbor — she’s family. When she disappears, only Tash holds the key that might bring her back. Tash didn’t want to go to camp, didn’t want to spend the summer with a bunch of strangers, didn’t want to be separated from the only two people she has ever been able to count on: her uncle Kevin, who saved her from foster care, and Cap’n Jackie, who lives next door. Camp turns out to be pretty fun, actually, but when Tash returns home, Cap’n Jackie is gone. And Tash needs her — the made-up stories of dolphin-dragons, the warm cookies that made everything all right after a fight, the key Cap’n Jackie always insisted had magic in it. The Captain always said all Tash had to do was hold it tight and the magic would come. Was it true? Could the key bring Cap’n Jackie back? In a heartfelt and stunningly written story, Pat Schmatz introduces readers to a tenacious, fiercely loyal girl struggling to let go of the fantasies and fears of her childhood . . . and say yes to everything that lies ahead.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this middle-grade drama, 11-year-old Tash returns home from summer camp to discover that Cap'n Jackie, the elderly next-door neighbor who's helped raise her, has been admitted to a rehab facility following an accident. Still unsettled from a fight the two had before she left for camp, Tash can't wait to make amends and have everything go back to normal. What will she do without her friend's cookies, hugs, and fanciful stories? Unfortunately, Cap'n Jackie is unresponsive after undergoing hip surgery, and Tash must find a way to break through to her. She wonders if the magical key Cap'n Jackie once gave her might help. Schmatz (Lizard Radio) captures the uncertainty and turbulent emotions of a girl struggling with change and loss while examining the value of found family. Schmatz's novel is heartfelt, but the letters and memories that depict Tash's relationship with Cap'n Jackie fail to fully explore the true strength of their bond and its impact upon the story. Ages 8 12.
