Art Corriveau

The early 1900s. It is an age when nature is stepping aside for the steamroller that is science. A father with twins so identical even he can't tell them apart shows up in eight-year-old Lily's Vermont yard, looking for carpentry work. Unabashed and unconventional, Lily takes to the boys and they can't help falling in love with her as only little boys can when a girl can climb a tree faster or shows no fear diving into a pond from a great height.
Fast forward ten years and one of the twins, show more Oren, comes calling. He has never forgotten Lily. Eighteen years old, Lily now works as a librarian in the same town she never left. Did she stay where she was just so Oren or Ian could find her? Oren came back first. They marry, build a house and settle into the community as husband and wife. Soon after brother Ian arrives in town after surviving the horrors of the First Great War. He is a shell-shocked sleepwalking mess and Lily feels the old pull towards him; with Oren's blessing she welcomes Ian into their home. The three set up house as if time has stood still and they are once again children, locked in the play of deep friendship. Only now with adult alcohol to go with the games and music and loud laughter. It isn't long before their unconventional arrangement becomes the talk of the town.
More than a story about conformity and appearances, Housewrights is a lesson in identity and acceptance. It is about changing with the times and making peace with the past. show less

Nicky Flynn’s life just got a whole lot harder. His parents are going through a messy divorce, and as a result he’s starting a new life, in a new city, in a new school. Now his mom has brought home Reggie, an eighty-pound German shepherd fresh from the animal shelter, who used to be a seeing-eye dog. At first Nick isn’t sure about this canine intrusion—it’s just another in a series of difficult changes. Soon, however, Nick is on the path to finding out why a seeing-eye dog would be show more left at an animal shelter, and along the way discovers that Reggie is a true friend that Nick can rely on. But when he tries to reconnect with his dad, Nick puts everything on the line, including the life of his new best friend. show less

As a New Englander, I enjoyed this depiction of rural Vermont life in the 1920s. The characters were interestingly modern but placed in a historical small-town setting. It's gentle prose mixed with a few unique perspectives on housebuilding, the nature of conflicting desires, and the tension between the public and private made this book a relaxing and enjoyable read.

It's 2009 and Tony DiMarco has moved into a new home, a house at 13 Hangman Court, that is literally falling apart from age. He is 13 and he lives in the attic. It seems that he shares the attic with other 13 year olds - all alive, but living in their own time in history. Together they solve a mystery, find a treasure and catch a murderer.

Art Corriveau has constructed a marvelous tale in this junior fiction book. I thoroughly enjoyed it. And I learned a bit of history at the same time...I show more had never heard of The 1919 Great Molasses Flood in Boston and was amazed to find that it was a real event. The ballplayer Ted Williams plays a part in the book, as does John F. "Honey" Fitzgerald (JFK's grandfather), Frederick Douglass, William Lloyd Garrison, and Paul Revere. A nice addition at the end is a summary of things in the book that actually happened.

The fabric of history is carefully woven into the story, each of the boys providing his part, like pieces of a puzzle, so that at the end, just in the nick of time.... show less