Anne Laurel Carter

While Gwyn's little sister Linden is excited and seemingly happy about the family moving from Vancouver, British Columbia to Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia, Gwyn does not want to move, to leave her friends, her home (she asks her parents for three promises, learning to play a musical instrument, a treehouse and a horse). Will Gwyn get her three wishes? And will Mahone Bay ever feel like and be home?

Anne Laurel Carter's evocative [b:My Home Bay|2277942|My Home Bay|Anne Laurel show more Carter|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1211498002s/2277942.jpg|2284053] poignantly and realistically captures the angst, sadness, and yes, the anger and frustration many children can and do feel when faced with and confronted by the concept of having to move. Permanently relocating to a different street, a different city, a different province, a different country can be a traumatic experience for children, especially because they generally have neither much choice nor input (the family decides to move, to immigrate, to emigrate, and the children are for the most part not only expected to accept this, but to not make a fuss, to not pout, to appear happy and accepting). Gwyn's parents might to a point understand her reluctance, but when she is unhappy during their cross-country drive, her father loses patience and simply cannot understand why she has sulked from west coast to east (he thinks that she has sulked long enough, not really comprehending that Gwyn cannot just extinguish her sadness or will it to go away, that her sadness is both internal and external).

At least Gwyn's parents do seem to make somewhat of an effort to ease the transition for their daughter. They keep their promise of a musical instrument, and Gwyn and Linden do get a treehouse (constructed in Gwyn's favourite pine). As the months go by, Gwyn also begins to slowly appreciate Nova Scotia and its natural beauty, especially the salt marsh; Mahone Bay really does more and more become "my home bay" to Gwyn. However, she still has not received her third request, her third wish (a horse), which, at Christmas time, turns out to be an aquarium full of sea horses. And I have to admit that the sea horses, although providing a cute and even slightly humorous ending for [b:My Home Bay|2277942|My Home Bay|Anne Laurel Carter|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1211498002s/2277942.jpg|2284053] also somewhat irritate me personally, because the parents have basically taken their promise of a horse and changed it into sea horses, using semantics to show that they have, in fact, kept their word to their daughter.

The illustrations by Alan and Lea Daniel, although bright and lushly descriptive, are not really my cup of tea. They do provide a lovely and for the most part successful mirror of the narrative, but for me, there is a bit too much of an emphasis on human characters, on people, and not enough attention directed at and towards Nova Scotia's natural beauty (I would definitely have appreciated more seascapes). I still highly recommend [b:My Home Bay|2277942|My Home Bay|Anne Laurel Carter|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1211498002s/2277942.jpg|2284053] (especially to and for children who have experienced or are experiencing the trauma and excitement of moving, of relocating to a new home). However, if I were reading this story with or to children (especially if they were slightly older), I would likely also discuss the third promise with them (and ask wether they thought that the parents giving Gwyn and Linden sea horses for Christmas instead of a real horse was keeping their word, was keeping their promise). show less

Telling the story of the conflicting sides between Palestinian and Israeli people, this book gives readers a chance to live in the shoes of a Palestinian girl who has gone against the norm and become a shepherd like her grandfather. Many changes happen around her family's land as she grows into the role she has chosen for herself and these things directly affect her livelihood, not to mention the fate of her family.

I was easily caught up in this story and felt I had lived through parts of it show more myself. The writing made it easy to sympathize with the shepherd's family, but I felt wasn't overly cruel to the Israeli side, though they were clearly the "bad guys" in this story. Yes, many bad things happened because of the way the Israelis treated her family, but the inclusion of an Israeli "friend" for the girl tries to soften things a bit and succeeds where it needs to, I think. Their time together, short as it is, is proof that not every person in one group is incapable of thinking of the consequences of the group's actions and how they hurt people on the "other side."

This book for middle school aged readers is an excellent look at character and recent history that we should not ignore. show less

I found this wonderful collection of essays when I was reserving Jennifer Robson's The Gown at my library. Susan Whelan and Anne Laurel Carter, themselves writers, invited several dozen Canadian women writers to submit a written piece about their wedding dress, and then selected the ones that appear in this volume.

I LOVED this book. A woman's recollections of her wedding clothes will never be about only the dress, but the people - her groom, her parents, and herself. There were stories about show more a wide range of weddings and wedding attire.

I highly recommend this to any woman who has ever had - or wanted to have - a wedding. show less

Recommended Ages: Gr. 6-9

Plot Summary: Amani, a shepherd in modern-day Palestine, doesn't go to school, but instead learns to be a shepherd from her grandfather. When a settlement begins to violently take over Amanis' family's land by force, Amani and her family peacefully protest, even after Amani's uncle and father are arrested.

Recurring Themes: Israel-Palestine relations, good vs. evil, right vs. wrong, family, shepherding, religion (Jews, Muslims, Christians), reaction to unwanted show more behaviors, value of school, language

Controversial Issues: The Israel-Palestine conflict is a touchy subject. In this particular book, the Israeli's are the people who are doing wrong.

Personal Thoughts: Through most of this book, I was confused by character names, and probably should have kept notes. At one point, I thought the donkey and the grandfather had the same name. The last third of the book really bothered me because, as a Jew, I was greatly annoyed by the poor decisions made by the people in the Jewish settlement. They harassed & arrested Amani's family members. They built roads on their land. And at the end, they used a bulldozer to destroy Amani's family's olive trees, houses, and barn. The settlers even killed some of the animals in the story. I think the way the settlers behaved was inappropriate, and I was proud of how Amani's family chose to respond peacefully. The only good Jewish characters were a Rabbi and a boy from the settlement.

According to the information about the author, Anne spent time working on kibbutzim and stayed with Palestinian families to do research for this book. I am personally interested in her original interest in the Israel-Palestine conflict, and to know her religious background.

While this book greatly bothers me because it is a negative portrayal of Jews, I am glad it exists. It has prompted me to do more research about the poor decisions made on both sides of the conflict. show less