Disappear Home

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Pub Date 01 Mar 2015 | Archive Date 13 Jun 2015

Description

In 1970, as the hippie movement is losing its innocence, Shoshanna and her six-year-old sister, Mara, escape from Sweet Earth Farm, a declining commune, run by their tyrannical and abusive father, Adam. Their mother, Ella, takes them to San Francisco, where they meet one of her old friends, Judy, and the four of them decide to head off and try to make a life together. Finding a safe haven at the farm of kind, elderly Avery Elliot, the four of them find some measure of peace and stability. Then their mother’s crippling depression returns. Confused and paranoid, Ella is convinced that she and the girls must leave before Adam finds them and extracts revenge. The girls don’t wish to leave the only stable home they’ve ever had. But as Ella grows worse and worse, events conspire to leave them to face a choice they never could have imagined. Shoshanna has always watched over her sister and once again she has to watch over her ailing mother. Will she ever live a "normal" life?

In 1970, as the hippie movement is losing its innocence, Shoshanna and her six-year-old sister, Mara, escape from Sweet Earth Farm, a declining commune, run by their tyrannical and abusive father...


Marketing Plan

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*Prepublication buzz campaign, including ARC distribution to industry big mouths, media, booksellers, and bloggers

*ARC distribution at ALA Midwinter

*Social media campaign across Albert Whitman & Co. profiles

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*Trade, library, and consumer print and online advertising.

*Prepublication buzz campaign, including ARC distribution to industry big mouths, media, booksellers, and bloggers

*ARC distribution at ALA...


Available Editions

EDITION Other Format
ISBN 9780807524688
PRICE $16.99 (USD)

Average rating from 58 members


Featured Reviews

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This book was delightful to read and had me not wanting to put it down. The plot, the character, and everything inbetween seemed so beautifully out together like pieces in a jigsaw fitting into each other.There are so many YA novels with romance, and while I love that (obviously, since I write it), sometimes I want to read a book about a main character just trying to survive and find security amid chaos. And that's what I got here. This is a unique YA. I love the "escaping from a hippie commune" idea. The characters are all well-drawn and the two girls in this story, Shoshanna and Mara, are easy to root for.

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This was way different than the books I usually choose to read. I'm not typically interested in books set in earlier decades, but I was really intrigued by the description. I set myself up to be disappointed - it's not rare for the descriptions of books to be exaggerated to seem better than it really is. I was pleasantly surprised to find this book to be as good as it seemed, if not better.

This is a young adult book that involves a teenage girl that is not obsessed with boys and dating. A story that revolves around the characters surviving through awful events and coming out on the other side. These things don't occur in YA books as much as they should. Even the brilliant dystopian novels that have come out throughout the past few years rely too much on romance. This was a breath of fresh air, and I'm so glad I read it.

The book was inspiring and emotional. I cared deeply for all of the characters, and felt actual disgust and fear in regards to their abusive father/husband Adam Ebersole. There were a few things that I wished went a bit deeper (like the police keeping an eye on Judy's friends after finding the stolen car near their shop and the stolen silverware made into bracelets) but for the most part I was impressed with how well the story flowed. Time passed appropriately, I felt, and the conflicts were seen through fully. When I had to put the book down to go to work or do other things I was itching to get back to it. It was that good.

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Solid dysfunctional family narrative set in the 1970s Bay Area.

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Goodreads Synopsis: In 1970, as the hippie movement is losing its innocence, Shoshanna and her six-year-old sister, Mara, escape from Sweet Earth Farm, a declining commune, run by their tyrannical and abusive father, Adam. Their mother, Ella, takes them to San Francisco, where they meet one of her old friends, Judy, and the four of them decide to head off and try to make a life together. Finding a safe haven at the farm of kind, elderly Avery Elliot, the four of them find some measure of peace and stability. Then their mother's crippling depression returns. Confused and paranoid, Ella is convinced that she and the girls must leave before Adam finds them and extracts revenge. The girls don't wish to leave the only stable home they've ever had. But as Ella grows worse and worse, events conspire to leave them to face a choice they never could have imagined. Shoshanna has always watched over her sister and once again she has to watch over her ailing mother. Will she ever live a "normal" life?

My Review: Who doesn’t like the peace and love folk? This book was a breath of fresh air and completely different from anything I’ve read lately. It’s about two young girls – Shoshanna (15) and Mara (6) and their mother, Ella and their life on the run. The book starts out with the three leaving their home at a run down old commune full of sketchy people, and where life takes them. They meet up with old friends, and adventure to a new life together, a happier life together. They escape an abusive husband/father, a horrible place to live for a family, and start to rebuild. The characters are extremely well thought out and realistic, and everything seems so read and I just love it. This is a great story. I imagine this is how people would be in the time and setting they’re in. The ending was happy and beautiful and just so fulfilling. I want to read it again and again. Sorry for the short review, but it’s an awesome book and I definitely recommend you check it out! I got my copy from Netgalley. Thanks for reading!

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I received a copy of Disappear Home in exchange for an honest review. Thanks to Albert Whitman and Company and Netgalley. A copy of this review is also on my blog: www.bookblogbird.weebly.com

Disappear Home tells the story of Shoshanna and her mother and sister. It’s 1970 and they have just escaped the Sweet Earth Farm where they have lived with their violent father and a bunch of other hippies for the past few years. They flee to San Francisco and meet up with a friend of theirs, Judy, and the four of them try to create a new life together in the nearby countryside.

I have a bit a fascination not only for the hippie movement of the late ‘60s but also for the aftermath in the early ‘70s, so this book pressed a lot of buttons for me. I loved the descriptions of when the family lived in Haight-Ashbury in the Summer of Love, but more than this I liked the way the author described how the hippie movement had changed by the early seventies, how there were still plenty of people who believed in the whole peace and love ethos, but that for many the whole scene had turned a bit skeevy with drug addicts and panhandlers where there used to be flower children.

The writing is simple enough to keep the plot flowing well but descriptive enough to give you a real sense of what it was like to live then, basically as an itinerant. Shoshanna and her sister Mara have never been to school, their mum never wants to stay long enough anywhere to put roots down, both from a dislike of authority and the government and a fear that their father will find them. I felt really sorry for Mara as all she wanted was some stability and to be like other kids.

The story is told from a distant third person POV and although Shoshanna is clearly supposed to be the main character, her sister, mother and Judy also take an equal portion of the spotlight. Although the POV meant I didn’t connect with Shoshanna as a character that much, it was interesting to see what life was like for the other characters as well.

Judy seemed like a really grounded, lovely person. Shoshanna’s mum seemed completely flaky in some of her beliefs - she refused to see a doctor about her cough, claiming that the body could heal itself and refused to let her children eat chocolate or ice-cream because junk food is apparently a right-wing conspiracy by The Man to try to kill minorities with diabetes and heart disease - but at the same time she was a fragile, damaged person with mental health issues, so she was still likeable.

Shoshanna’s dad, Adam, was a bit of a one-dimensional baddie, but it was interesting to see the full extent of his evilness to unfold as the story progressed, from someone who was violent to his family, to being a drug addict and dealer and murderer.

All in all I’d definitely recommend Disappear Home, and because the plot is quite gentle and gets wrapped up in a nice, neat Happily Ever After I’d recommend it for the lower end of the Young Adult age range.

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This was a really sweet read! I loved how mature Shoshanna was, and how her POV didn't sound like three year old.

A really lovely story that I enjoyed a lot!

Thank you to the Publisher for giving me an ARC!

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A really interesting book that I highly reccomend to everyone.

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