In the middle of this century, the Swift River towns in western Massachusetts were drowned - purchased by the government and flooded in order to form the Quabbin Reservoir. "Letting Swift River Go" tells of this dramatic event through the eyes of a young girl, Sally Jane, as she watches her thriving hometown transformed into a wilderness and then submerged. Sally Jane's story vividly recalls life and changing times in rural America: playing by the Old Stone Mill and later watching it be torn down; harvesting maple sap and seeing those same trees uprooted; walking to school along a winding blacktop road and returning many years later to float above the same road in a rowboat on the new reservoir.
Jane Yolen is the author of a great number of books for young readers, including How Do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight. Among her many awards are a Caldecott Medal, a Caldecott Honor, two Nebula Awards, two Christopher Medals, and the World Fantasy Award. She is also a poet and teacher of writing and literature.
Barbara Cooney traveled the world, lived in a house by the sea in Maine, and made the world more beautiful through her art. She was a two-time Caldecott Medal winner, for Chanticleer and the Fox in 1959 and Ox-Cart Man in 1980. Her beloved book Miss Rumphius was the winner of the American Book Award in 1982. Barbara Cooney died in 2000 at the age of eighty-two.
Target Age: 4-8
Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Pub Date: September 01, 1995
0.14" H x 9.98" L x 8.9" W
32 pages
paperback