Swallow's Dance

The author of Nim’s Island brings readers another island adventure tale about a young girl on an island in the Mediterranean who shares her tale with readers of growing, love, loss, and grief as only the very young can say it. The narrative deftly shifts from prose to poetry and back in a long story-dirge that reminds the world of an island lost to ash and fire long ago.

Perhaps one of the most beautiful middle grade/young adult novels I have ever read, Swallow’s Dance is a book I will require my students to read while they study Ancient Greece and the civilizations around the Mediterranean. This book will supplement any history curriculum and will make a fine leisure read as well. Young readers will not walk away from this book with only a story-the triumph of Leira will linger on their hearts well into adulthood, as many of the great books we adult readers read as children stick with us even in our older age.

Wendy Orr also expands the literary style of the typical middle grade novel to encompass more than just prose writing. Lyrical writing and poetic narrative are becoming more popular, as some recently published novels, such as Inside Out and Back Again are written entirely in verse and tell a story, akin to the epic poetry of old. Though the writing style of narrative verse is not for everyone, it could be if it were introduced in the middle grade reading years, as much of the literature of history is written in verse (The Epic of Gilgamesh, The Iliad, The Odyssey, Beowulf, etc.). This is a read children should definitely not miss.