Stefan's Story [Hardcover]

Valerie Hobbs (Author)

Book Description

Age Level: 10 and up | Grade Level: 5 and up

A powerful follow-up to Carolina Crow Girl

Two years have gone by since the day Carolina and Stefan sent the crow they rescued flying to join its family. Now Stefan is on a plane heading to Oregon to visit Carolina, still his best friend, and he’s nervous. Carolina’s life has changed. Will she be different? What if she doesn’t want him for a best friend anymore? Don’t thirteen-year-old girls want boyfriends that are, well, boyfriends? His wheelchair gets in the way of that. Once Stefan arrives, he does his best not to let it get in the way of going out to sea with Carolina and the old fisherman she helps. And he doesn’t let it keep him from fighting to protect an old-growth forest from loggers. He is determined that it won’t keep him or Carolina from having as great a time as they had when they were eleven. He tries to keep things just the way they used to be. His heart is set on it. But is hers?

Stefan is ready to take on new challenges and overcome obstacles. He’s used to them. He just doesn’t know how big they can get or what he will have to do when they come straight at him, engines screaming.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 6-8-Wheelchair-bound Stefan is on his way to visit his friend Carolina in Oregon. He is unsure how the relationship will play out, as the friends haven't seen one another in two years. Once in Haskell's Bay, he finds Carolina embroiled in a controversy. A huge logging company has bought a pristine, old-growth forest. The loggers are excited about the prospect of employment, while the fishermen and environmentalists are against it. The discord even separates Carolina's mother from her fiancee Hank. After he is injured while riding in a truck on which the brake lines had been cut, Carolina and Stefan must find a way to rescue cantankerous, sometimes-drunken Otto, who has been falsely accused of the deed. Someone must also figure out how to rescue the community as a whole. Hobbs's characterization is the strong point of this novel. Stefan's desire to be treated like everyone else is shaded by his actual need for subtly given assistance. His shy and new feelings for Carolina are contrasted with his dislike for her motorcycle-riding admirer who can deliver a deft kiss. Hank is clearly shown to be a real hero, not for flashy deeds, but for his determination to support his loved ones through hard, unglamorous work. Hobbs also gives proper balance to the economic pressures of the issue. Readers first met Carolina and Stefan in Carolina Crow Girl (Farrar, 1999), but this novel easily stands on its own.
Cindy Darling Codell, Clark Middle School, Winchester, KY
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Gr. 5-8. Readers don't need to know Carolina Crow Girl (1999) to be enthralled by this sequel, set two years later, which focuses on Stefan, 13, who visits his best friend, Carolina, in her small Oregon town. Once again, a conservation drama bonds young people--big business is about to clear a rare old-growth forest--and once again, Hobbs shows that there are no simple solutions or clear divisions between good and bad. Carolina's stepfather, a lumberjack, needs the work; he's also a decent guy who quietly helps Stefan with his wheelchair. Stefan's disability is never downplayed, but that isn't all he is, and now his friendship with Carolina is changing to something more intense. With simple poetry, Hobbs conveys the wonder of the forest, where Stefan and Carolina hold each other in the quiet and hear the forest orchestra of clicking beetles, scurrying chipmunks, and dripping water. The wonder of this story is the fusion of the small things with exciting action: Could a hero ride into town in a wheelchair? Hazel Rochman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 10 and up
  
• Hardcover: 176 pages
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR); 1st edition (August 14, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0374372403
• ISBN-13: 978-0374372408
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.8 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.7 ounces
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,017,432 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

What I've learned in all the years since I began writing is that each of us has at least one special story to tell. Some stories are sad, some funny, but all are as unique as our fingerprints. We are storytellers, every one of us. Some of us just have to write those stories down. I didn't always want to be a writer though. What I longed for most was to be an ice skater, but when I was fifteen I moved with my family from New Jersey to California and there went the ice.

My first short story began with a journal entry written when I was nineteen, after a close friend of mine met with a tragic accident. Many years later, that same story became the basis for my first novel, How Far Would You Have Gotten If I Hadn't Called You Back . Eight novels have followed, with three more to come in the next few years. Writing is the hardest work I've ever done, but by far the most fun.