{Synopsis} – Nola Sutton has been best friends and neighbors with the Swift boys for practically her whole life. There’s the youngest, Kevin, who never stops talking; the oldest, Brian, who’s always kind and calm; and then there’s Canaan, the ringleader and Nola’s best-best friend. Nola can’t imagine her life without the Swift boys — they’ll always be like this, always be friends.
{My thoughts} – Nola Sutton has always lived next door to the Swift family for as long as she can remember. They have always been a complete family that got along with one another and made things work, even when things weren’t always so great. That’s why it was strange when one night Mr. Swift pulled out of his driveway and never came back again.
Nola had seen him leave, he waked good-bye to her. He didn’t even say good-bye to his children, he had just left them there with their mother. He left them confused, unsure and angry. Brian the oldest of the boys decided he had to do everything in order to make up for their father being gone. He was trying to make things easier for his mother who only slept all day until she found a job, then she worked and slept but was barely around. Eventually it got to be too much for him and he left to stay with friends for awhile, while he was gone the two younger boys suffered a lot. Canaan didn’t know what to think about his father leaving but he kept believing that he was going to come back, he just had to. He didn’t think his dad would just leave and not bother to say good-bye. Because his father left, it left him very sad and angry and he misdirected a lot of that anger at Nola when all she did was try to be there for him and be his friend. Kevin seemed to have dealt with it the worst. He wasn’t able to deal with his daddy just leaving. It hurt him and because of it he just stopped talking. He went from talking everyday all day long to not talking at all. He became completely mute and barely communicated through nods or shoulder shrugs.
This whole summer was suppose to be the best summer ever for these four kids. It turned out to be a poor summer and a decent summer rolled into one for Nola. Nola learned that Canaan wasn’t really her best friend anymore after he had made some poor choices and decided to hang with some children that would rather destroy other peoples property and be bullies then be nice and actually be someones friend. Nola kept trying throughout the book to be there for him and she kept on holding onto the hope that it would still be a good summer even if things were bad. She ended up not having much of a friendship left with either of the boys, but she did mend some friendship with two other children, Felicia and Teddy. It turned out that Felicia was really her friend all along but she hadn’t really given her a chance because she always with the Swift boys. And Teddy he was mean to her but only because he wanted to be friends with her and didn’t know how to get her attention since Canaan had always been her bodyguard so to speak.
This book is about a lot of things. It’s about love, family, friendship, accepting circumstances out of your control, learning to move on when things aren’t fair to you. I really enjoyed reading this book. It was another one of those fabulous tear jerkers, so have some kleenex handy while your read. However, I think any child that is dealing with a parent leaving them, a mother getting married, a friendship falling a part and moving to a new place could benefit from reading this book. I also think that any child that just enjoys reading as a passion could enjoy reading this book. It is well written and realistic enough that any child going through similar circumstances should have no problem relating to the content within the pages. The main thing I got out of this book is that even though people and times change, it doesn’t mean that it is a bad thing to accept things for what they become and move forward in life. Sometimes circumstances change people and it’s for the better or worse, but those changes help to shape people into who they become in the future. The best anyone can do is learn from the poor past experiences and be strong and push forward because in the end it can only get better, it can’t stay all bad all the time.
{quotes i liked} –
01} I never told the boys I saw their daddy leave that night. -Nola
02} I waved.
And he waved back.
I found out later that was more of a good-bye than his boys ever got. -Nola
03} “Blue!” Kevin said. “That’s my favorite color, you know. All the best things are blue. The ocean. The Sky. Like Shy Walker’s lightsaber.”
04} He’s coming back Brian. If he wasn’t he wasn’t, he’d have said good-bye. -Canaan.
05} So Kevin and Brian left and it was just me and Canaan and the loud music and a cool, soft patch of grass to sit on. We sang along to the songs for awhile and sometimes Canaan would change the words, making up silly versions to make me laugh. -Nola
06} But you know, you ain’t met him yet. You might like him. And I know he’ll like you. Everybody does. Maybe don’t think about it like losing your mom – look at it like getting a new person. Ain’t it better to have two people who love you then one? -Brian
07} One little memory. One tiny moment. -Nola
08} I missed Canaan. Not this new, mean Canaan, but the one I’d grown up with. My best friend. It felt like he’d vanished over night and hadn’t bothered to say good-bye. -Nola
09} Unfortunately, he’s lost somebody very important to him, and sometimes when that happens – when people lose someone – they change. -Mr. Briggs
10} The fact was, things had changed. And they were gonna keep changing, whether I wanted them to or not. -Nola
Final Conclusion: 5 Star Rating.
