The Power of S.A.D.
Mariposa Lane Book 1
by Maggie Lynch
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Pub Date Mar 30 2024 | Archive Date May 30 2024
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Description
Upper Middle Grade / Lower YA Best for ages 11-15
How can Akna and her two sisters help Mama get well and save her family if they are in foster care? Rule 1: Don't get comfortable there.
With the help of her ancestors, Akna Sales has used her power of S.A.D.—Strength And Determination—to keep her family together since her beloved grandparents died two years ago. The day the social worker takes Akna and her two sisters to a foster home, all her plans for helping Mama get well and saving her family are upended. It seems that calling on her ancestors to enhance those powers is not working any more.
Although every foster kid living with the Bohns at Mariposa Lane has problems, they’ve somehow created a resilient, loving family life Akna never could have imagined. But the more secure her situation becomes, the more she fears her real family will be lost.
Despite her resistance, Akna discovers how to weave the complex legacy of her past into opportunities for a promising future. With the help of a caring teacher, a new friend at school, Akna’s own determination, and the love of her foster family, she learns how to once again welcome the goodness in life, even when some things will always feel broken.
For Teachers:
For SEL discussions, this book is perfect for discussions of friendships, identity, grief, taking risks, overcoming challenges, honesty, and resiliency.
Advance Praise
Top review from the United States
San Diego Reader
5.0 out of 5 stars Heartbreaking and Heartwarming
Reviewed in the United States on April 24, 2024
Prolific author Maggie Lynch’s The Power of S.A.D. makes this reader ready for the next book in The Mariposa Lane series for ages eleven to fifteen. Responsible, eleven-year-old Akna Sales, who tells an Oregon social worker that she “might as well be fourteen,” means it.
Two years earlier, Akna became the head of her family after the deaths of her beloved Guatemalan-immigrant grandparents. Her substance-abusing mother frequently vanishes for weeks, leaving the girl to take care of her two sisters, eight-year-old Hai, and five-year-old Nakia. Her ancient Guatemalan K’iche’ culture helps Akna call upon her ancestors for “strength and determination” (S.A.D.) as she adroitly navigates the challenges of raising her siblings. But alert neighbors intervene, and the three girls are sent to a foster home.
With a fresh start in a safe, nurturing place and a welcoming school, they have opportunities to grow in needed skills about life, family, love, support, friendship, forgiveness, and teamwork. But hurdles must be jumped along the way, and unique relationships formed, tested, and cemented.
Lynch artfully weaves in her experience growing up near relatives who fostered over one hundred children. She is still in touch with many members of that extended family. In addition, Lynch includes what she learned from working with Guatemalan refugees in her church. From this important book, readers will likely understand the author’s intent to show “people making heroic choices, one messy moment at a time.”
Available Editions
| ISBN | 9781962065283 |
| PRICE | $4.50 (USD) |
| PAGES | 250 |
