Tending to Grace by Kimberly Newton Fusco

I admit it. I have a thing for scratchy old farm women who are hard on the outside, soft on the inside and full of solutions to life’s problems. That’s why I like Richard Peck’s A Year Down Yonder and A Long Way to Chicago. And that’s also why I like Tending to Grace by Kimberly Newton Fusco. Grandma Dowdel and Agatha Thornhill are birds of a feather, scruffy old hags with hearts of gold.

When city-bred fifteen year old Cornelia is thrust upon her country Aunt Agatha because her mother is running off to Las Vegas with her boyfriend, C-c-c-cornelia’s world is torn apart. She is sure her mother will be coming back soon, even though the signs point elsewhere. Because of her stutter, Cornelia tries to be invisible. Agatha won’t hear of it. She’s a ‘stand up for yourself’ type of person.

Fusco’s writing is so expressive, from the beginning, comparing Cornelia’s life to a clothesline, through to the end, as both Cornelia and Agatha learn things about the other. Tending to Grace has mountains and frog races and fiddleheads and fun. It’s a feel good book, so feel good and read it.