The Crystal Garden [Hardcover]

Vicki Grove (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 9, 1995

After moving to a new home, Eliza hopes to make exciting new friends with a cliquish group of girls and is willing to pass a daring test for the honor, but finds a real friendship test in a bookish fellow student.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Gr. 5^-8. Life becomes complicated for Eliza when she moves from Kansas City to Gouge Eye, Missouri, following her mama's country singer boyfriend to an ugly pink trailer and a dead-end social life. But Eliza is determined to join the popular, rich girls' clique even if it means sacrificing her friendship with Diedre, the only other seventh-grade girl in Gouge Eye. The plot is familiar, but the story is intricate and poignant, inviting readers to evaluate the different kinds of friends Eliza makes and the boyfriends her mother chooses. Ultimately, the story pushes kids to assess the survival choices people make and analyze the quality of that survival. Pretty heavy stuff, but Grove writes so well that the ideas challenge rather than overwhelm. Frances Bradburn

Review

Eliza and her mother are trying to make a fresh start in a new town; but Eliza can only dream of their eventual return to their old home, while her mother's flighty boyfriend places too much burden on their shoulders. A crystal garden project brings out new revelations about real friendship and a sense of home in this engrossing story. -- Midwest Book Review

Product Details

• Hardcover: 217 pages
• Publisher: Putnam Juvenile (May 9, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0399218130
• ISBN-13: 978-0399218132
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.7 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,885,476 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Finding Out The Truth, October 16, 2002

By 

E.A.M.S. Student (Elkhorn, WI) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Crystal Garden (Library Binding)

The Crystal Garden is an awsome book. It starts out when Eliza and her mother are living together, along way away from her mothers boyfriend. But one day her moms boyfriend came over and ask them to move in at his house, a small pink trelier in the small town of Gouge eye.Eliza is kind of an out cast at school and see's this as her chance tho change her life and be
popular. When she gets there she becomes friends with a neighbor, Dreidre. Once school starts she began to hang with the popular kids, but she soon relized what was really goning on. The popular kids were using her and Burl,her moms boyfriend was using her moms money from the waitressing job she got at a small resturant in town. It ends up that Eliza finds her real frind Dre, and Eliza, her mom, dre, and dres mom all move in together in a small up town apartment.

4.0 out of 5 stars The Crystal Garden, February 9, 2006

A Kid's Review

This review is from: The Crystal Garden (Hardcover)

THe story begins when Eliza, the main charactor, has to move from her home to a completely new place. Determined to be popular, she tries not to become friends with Dierdre, the girl next door who is even weirder and less cool than Eliza herself. Despite her efforts, Dierdre shows her a raft she's working on in secret, a raft meant for only one thing- escape. On the first day of school, Eliza is shunned by the girls she most wants to be like- the girls who wear designer jeans and and look cool without even trying. Finally, though, one girl notices her by asking herto help steal and encyclepedia from the school library. Eliza does it, and from then on she is invited to all the parties and sleepovers held by the girls form Richview Heights. In her newfound popularity, she tries to forget about Dierdre, but something she said keeps nagging her. "Aske her why she picked you," Dierdre had said, Finally Elaza asks the girl why. She tells Eliza that she knew she had once lied to a teacher, so she assumed that she would also steal the book... yeah. Bob the Builder.

4.0 out of 5 stars Pepin High Book Review, May 9, 2002

By 

Amber Bowen (Pepin, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Crystal Garden (Mass Market Paperback)

Eliza and her mother, Lorna, start off on a new adventure to start over from the tragic loss of Eliza's father by moving to a pink trailer in the small town of Gouge Eye, Missouri. Eliza throughout this book takes a number of tests to get herself in the "popular" crowd, and try's to make her "science-book" minded friend Deirdre understand. Even though she puts her relationships with people around her at great risks, she finally understands what real friendship is.