Shortlisted for Canadian Library Association Young Adult Book of the Year Award
2007 Manitoba Young Readers' Choice Award nominee
2007 Saskatchewan Young
Readers' Choice Willow Awards nominee
Canadian Children's Book Centre Our Choice Starred Selection
White Pine nominee, 2007
On New York Public Library's list of Books for the Teen Age, 2007
McNally Robinson announced that Wild Orchid was one of the top five best selling books in Saskatechewan in 2006.
Taylor Jane Simon is 18 years old and spending the summer with her mother in Prince Albert National Park. The holiday has been planned so Taylor's mother can spend time with her latest boyfriend, Danny, and work in the pizza restaurant near the park that Danny runs. Taylor would just as soon stay at home in Saskatoon, but because she suffers from an autistic condition called Asperger's Syndrome, she can't stay on her
own. Taylor's mother encourages her daughter to explore the park's possibilities on her own. For Taylor, whose life experience has been seriously limited, this means facing the test of meeting new people who work in the park's nature center–and facing it alone. Summer also holds out the possibility of finding her own boyfriend, though
Taylor isn't quite sure what that may involve. What she discovers will change her life forever.
Written as an epistolary novel, Wild Orchid is frank but optimistic, literal yet innocent. A courageous wit attends Taylor's gradual emergence as her own person, and the reader will find the exploration of Taylor's mind a revealing and heartwarming encounter.
Reviews:
"An honest, insightful, and compelling read."
Highly Recommended.
-- CM Magazine
"Brenna has done a credible job of capturing the voice of a young woman on the brink of maturity."
-- School Library Journal
"Taylor's voice draws the reader into an interesting, informative, and touching book that should be read by people of all ages, adults and teenagers."
-- Curled Up With a Good Kid's Book
"This novel, with its stunning cover, would make a good literature study at the middle school level."
-- Resource Links
Beverley Brenna is a Saskatchewan special education teacher who lives on an acreage near Saskatoon with her husband and three sons. Her previous titles include Daddy Longlegs at Birch Lane, Spider Summer and The Keeper of the Trees. Other YA short stories appear in anthologies such as Ronsdale's Winds Through Time and her short fiction for adults has been produced by CBC Radio.
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