Fiction - Island Peoples, Places & Cultures, Fiction - Emotions & Behaviors, Fiction - Schools & Friendship, Fiction - Family Life

Red Sand, Blue Sky

Name: Red Sand, Blue Sky
Author: Cathy Applegate
ISBN: 9781558612785

by Cathy Applegate

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Overview

This funny and surprising mystery/adventure is set in the brilliant desert landscape of the Australian outback. Twelve-year-old Amy arrives from Melbourne, unsettled by the starkly different landscape and people. There she meets an Aboriginal girl, Lana, who seems as different as anyone could be—in Amy’s eyes. As they learn more about each other’s cultures, they also find that they share the loss of their mothers, and their friendship deepens. Soon they are working together to uncover a sinister plot—which may put unto jeopardy everything and everyone they hold dear.

When twelve-year-old Amy goes to visit her Auntie Caroline, a nurse living in a community near Alice Springs, Australia, she and an Aboriginal girl become friends and help out during an emergency.

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Editorials

Publishers Weekly

One of two titles (along with Barbara Wilson's A Clear Spring 1-55861-277-7) launching the Girls First! mystery/adventure series, Applegate's (Rain Dance) thin novel takes place in the author's native Australia. While her father attends a conference in Canada, 12-year-old Amy leaves her Melbourne home to stay with her eccentric aunt on the Australian outback, where her aunt works in a health clinic. Initially feeling very much an outsider among the residents, Amy eventually becomes friends with Lana, an Aborigine who, like Amy, has fairly recently lost her mother. The author stiffly incorporates bits of the country's history and Aboriginal lore and tradition into a plot in which the girls take on criminals stealing Aboriginal sacred objects. Many passages are either forced ("Amy felt hurt and lonely. She was different from all these other children and felt left out of all the fun and excitement") or awkward ("It was hard for the two girls to remain glum when they were surrounded by so many smiling children who laughed at each other, sucking up the spaghetti like long worms").Unfortunately, Applegate's attempts at suspense and her dialogue also fall flat, making this a slow and unconvincing read. Ages 9-12. (Apr.) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

School Library Journal

Gr 5-7 A rather formulaic and predictable book in which two main characters with ostensibly nothing in common discover they are more alike than different. Amy, a 12-year-old from Melbourne, meets Lana, an Aboriginal peer, while visiting her Aunt Caroline in the Australian outback. At first, the girls clash, but as Amy gradually learns more about the Aboriginal culture and history, she gains a deeper understanding of Lana's way of life. At the novel's climax, the youngsters are forced to pool their resources to rescue Caroline when she is injured and protect a sacred site. This book could fill requests for stories set in other countries, but it lacks originality and spark and the characters are not interesting. -Ronni Krasnow, New York Public Library Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.