Winter Sky

Title: Winter Sky

 

Author: Patricia Reilly Giff

 

Summary: 11 year old, Siria, named after a star, lives in an apartment with her father, who is a firefighter. In the night, she secretly sneaks out of her apartment, along with her friend, Douglas, to the fires to make sure that her father is okay. However, she soon finds evidence of fires in different places and suspects that an arsonist is lurking around the city. Then, she finds evidence that it may be her best friend setting the fires. She confronts him and they get into an argument, just as Siria's father is injured. Siria uses her courage and strength to find the person behind the fires, help her injured father, care for an animal, and repair her broken friendship.

 

Comments: I really like Patricia Reilly Giff as an author in general, so I was expecting to like this book. However, it missed the mark a bit. I found it a little unrealistic that Siria could know where all the fires were and that she could really sneak out of her apartment building so flawlessly, without whoever was watching over her (such as Mimi) finding out. The book was very short, like some of her other books, but this one lacked in the usual amount of detail and character development that I had come to find from her writing. 

Siria was very likeable though, and I liked the extra information the book had; describing constellations and stars.

This book is a quick read, and while reading about fires could be scary for some young children, I think this book would be suitable for children ages 8+.

 

Complaints: I feel like the book lacked detail and character development. It was also rather short and it had a slow, yet fast-paced feel to it.

 

Rating: 3 stars