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Hummingbird Heart

by Robin Stevenson (Goodreads Author)

3.58 of 5 stars 3.58 · rating details · 55 ratings · 16 reviews

Sixteen-year-old Dylan has never met her father. She knows that her parents were just teenagers themselves when she was born, but her mother doesn't like to talk about the past, and her father, Mark, has never responded to Dylan's attempts to contact him. As far as Dylan is concerned, her family is made up of her mother, Amanda; her recently adopted younger sister, Karma;...more

Paperback, 280 pages

Published April 1st 2012 by Orca Book Publishers

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Dec 19, 2012 Fiona rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, november2012, goodreads-author

Dylan, 16, has never met her dad before. Her mom doesn't like using the term "father" and prefers to refer to him as a "sperm donor". After 16 years, her dad finally comes back, but not for a visit. His daughter, who is also Dylan's half sister, has cancer and needs Dylan's bone marrow to save a life. Ever since he came back, her life has been full of ups and downs, including losing her best friend to breaking up with her first boyfriend after 1 week. When she finally meets her half sister, she...more Dylan, 16, has never met her dad before. Her mom doesn't like using the term "father" and prefers to refer to him as a "sperm donor". After 16 years, her dad finally comes back, but not for a visit. His daughter, who is also Dylan's half sister, has cancer and needs Dylan's bone marrow to save a life. Ever since he came back, her life has been full of ups and downs, including losing her best friend to breaking up with her first boyfriend after 1 week. When she finally meets her half sister, she doesn't think that her father has been a loser all this time, she prays that the blood tests matches so she can help. Dylan's mom has been lying to Dylan all her life because of her teen pregnancy and also because her mom and dad had a matching tattoo of a hummingbird.

I first picked up this book because I found the title very interesting. The cover of the book also grabbed my attention... And yes, I occasionally choose books by its cover. Also, after reading a brief summary of this book, it really caught my heart. A teen girl that has never met her father and her mother has been lying to her all her life. The questions the author gives "What makes someone family?" That caught my attention because her mom adopted a younger sister named, Karma, and she has been considered family. Although they do not share the same DNA, after 2 strong years with each other, they have accepted each other to be family. But when her half sister and father comes into her life, she doesn't quite know if they are still family, even with the same DNA.

I finished this book because not only did it answer the questions Dylan has been dying to know, but teaches the reader that doing drugs, smoking cigarettes, and drinking are bad in life. Also, the book mentions how car accidents can happen with all those concerns. The one part that kept me motivated to read is when the author talks about sex. We're all in an age when one day it would happen. The author talks about how you are the one that decides whether or you want to be sexually active or not.

I would recommend this book to kids that are having a hard knowing about their family. Whether they know who their parents are or not. Sometimes, there are hidden secrets and all kids deserve to know. I would also recommend this book to kids who have only 1 parent. They feel different from the others and once they read this book, they'll realize that they are not alone. They will finally know that other kids have the same situation, feeling the same way that they feel. (less)

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Apr 21, 2013 Nirali rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2013

Spoilers ahead! Proceed with caution!

A very okay book. The voice of the narrator, 16-year-old Dylan, sounded more like that of a twelve-year-old. I wished this book was good. It could have been good, but instead, it goes with the typical tropes of the absent father, the troubling mother, the token ethnic girl (probably), the exotic name (of said token ethnic girl), the pregnant teenager, the bad-boy love interest, the child with cancer, the list goes on. The similes Stevenson uses were very clum...more Spoilers ahead! Proceed with caution!

A very okay book. The voice of the narrator, 16-year-old Dylan, sounded more like that of a twelve-year-old. I wished this book was good. It could have been good, but instead, it goes with the typical tropes of the absent father, the troubling mother, the token ethnic girl (probably), the exotic name (of said token ethnic girl), the pregnant teenager, the bad-boy love interest, the child with cancer, the list goes on. The similes Stevenson uses were very clumsy, and despite the story being interesting, the language was too young for it to be believably a sixteen-year-old's.

Not to mention that Dylan wasn't even very likeable as a character. She came off as overly whiny for the first few chapters, and then was continuously and annoyingly self-deprecating. She kept going on about how much she missed her best friend Kate because she had a boyfriend and how she had zero good attributes to warrant a boyfriend and-the worst of it-how she kept reminiscing about her middle school days when she and Kate would make fun of all those girls who had boyfriend and wore makeup.

Plus, she had random attributes that had nothing to do with the plot or subplot, like her being obsessed with the environment. While in a better-written book this could have been used to show her compassion which could have foreshadowed her decision to give the bone marrow, it was just random and clumsy in the book. Clumsy in the sense that there was, near the end of the book, an oil spill occurring on TV that makes her feel bad but is not heard of outside of this scene. And I will never, for the life of me, understand why she decided to include the topic of abortion and pregnant teenagers. It was completely irrelevant, as were Dylan's opinions on it, which conflicted directly with her reasoning for wanting to give the marrow to a little girl she barely knew.

But the book wasn't totally irredeemable. It had its nice family moments and Dylan's little sister Karma was a great character in a not-so-great novel. She was a good foil for the main character, mostly maintaining a good attitude about things, and a fun little sister. She seemed like the most complexly written character in the book. The mother was also written fairly well, although we get no explanations about what and why she did what she did. She was a weak character, but she did have her strong and maternal moments when she would help Dylan, or at least try to. Plus, the book ended on a nice note.(less)

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Aug 19, 2012 Diane rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: family-stories, fathers, high-school, washyarg, young-adult

Dylan has never met her father. For 16 years she has lived with her free-spirited mother. When her father contacts them out of the blue it turns out that what he’s really looking for is a bone marrow donor for his young daughter. His visit and request opens a flood gate of secrets and feelings both Dylan and her mother had hidden for 16 years.
This book was a very pleasant surprise. It’s new fiction published by Orca that is not aimed at reluctant readers. In spite of its unfortunate cover tha...more

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May 05, 2012 Sandy rated it 3 of 5 stars

Dylan is sixteen, the exact age her mother was when she became a single parent. Dylan knows nothing of her father other than the sketchy rare comments her mother makes about a one-night-stand. That is, until her father shows up in town and wants to meet her. Dylan’s mother has been lying about her relationship with Dylan’s father and this adds to the confusion his visit is causing. Not only is she shocked at his visit, but she is conflicted by the reason for his sudden interest. Mark, her Dad, h...more Dylan is sixteen, the exact age her mother was when she became a single parent. Dylan knows nothing of her father other than the sketchy rare comments her mother makes about a one-night-stand. That is, until her father shows up in town and wants to meet her. Dylan’s mother has been lying about her relationship with Dylan’s father and this adds to the confusion his visit is causing. Not only is she shocked at his visit, but she is conflicted by the reason for his sudden interest. Mark, her Dad, has come to ask her to be tested to possibly help save his other daughter who has leukemia. How can Dylan say no and possibly doom her half-sister to death?
Dylan is a responsible teen who looks out for the environment and who hasn’t had a real dating relationship yet. Her best friend is now busy with a boyfriend and Dylan feels left out. Then a new boy, Jax, begins to pay attention to her and she is flattered but not really invested in the relationship. Jax wants more from her physically than she’s willing to give and that causes her more anxiety. Dylan has a supportive mother but she’s not a real role model – she’s into tattoos, drinking, marijuana and frank discussions with her daughter of her sex life with men she dates. Amanda – the mother – is not the typical parent in teen fiction yet she may be the reality for some teens today.
Dylan’s confusion and her struggle to come to terms with meeting a father and sister she never knew before, make Dylan a sympathetic character. Her willingness to try to help her half-sister is one indication of her good heart. The writing of the book flows smoothly and the story builds with good momentum. Characters are real and some are multi-dimensional. In particular, Dylan’s mother is unique in that her wild crazy ways do not relegate her to the status of unfit parent. She really cares about her daughter and one can understand why she made the choices about deceiving her daughter for so long. A quick read; teens should find it interesting.
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Mar 04, 2012 Canadian Reader rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: young-adult

The gemlike hummingbird that graces the cover of Robin Stevenson’s fine new young adult novel is emblematic of the beauty, fragility, and evanescence of life. It is a particularly apt metaphor for her sensitive and searching central character, Dylan Jarvis, who sees so many signs of what’s wrong in the world—from holes in the ozone layer, to pesticides in food and “thousands of toxic chemicals coursing through our veins”—that she has developed vertical lines between her eyebrows and despairs as...more The gemlike hummingbird that graces the cover of Robin Stevenson’s fine new young adult novel is emblematic of the beauty, fragility, and evanescence of life. It is a particularly apt metaphor for her sensitive and searching central character, Dylan Jarvis, who sees so many signs of what’s wrong in the world—from holes in the ozone layer, to pesticides in food and “thousands of toxic chemicals coursing through our veins”—that she has developed vertical lines between her eyebrows and despairs as to whether there is really anything we can do to save the planet.

Dylan lives with her free-spirited, artsy, tattooed, and occasionally dope-smoking single mother, Amanda, and an adopted sister, Karma. Even if she is the product of Amanda’s one-night stand with a selfish “asshole” whom her mother says should be regarded a sperm-donor only, Dylan has also been assured that Amanda has had no regrets about bringing her into the world. The hummingbird tattooed on Amanda's wrist with its “wings spread midbeat” speaks to the centrality of Dylan in her mother's life. According to Amanda, the image relates to the sound of Dylan’s heartbeat in utero. As it turns out, however, that explanation is “a much better story than the real one” and Dylan is faced with untangling the web of her mother's lies about her biological father.

As the novel opens, Dylan is taking an annual birthday picture, one of many she believes her mother has mailed over the years to the father Dylan has never met. The earliest photographs were school ones, but when these elicited no response from this unknown man, family groupings seemed less embarrassing. Now, within days of the sixteenth birthday photo being snapped, Dylan’s father, an Ontario lawyer, has arrived on the west coast, apparently eager to meet her but really to make an urgent request that only a biological daughter can fulfill. To tell what that request is would give away some of the pleasure of reading this story, which covers some of the same terrain and themes of American young adult author Sarah Dessen: the fallibility of parents and our first painful efforts to understand them as confused people not so different from ourselves, family secrets, sexuality, and the many negotiations one makes along the road to adulthood. Stevenson’s telling is perhaps slightly rawer, however.

It is difficult for those of us who have always known who our parents are to fully appreciate the situation of those who have not--the urgency of the need to identify where we came from as well as the fear and trepidation of piecing together the puzzle. Stevenson explores these mixed feelings well in her book. At the same time, she also shows her beautiful, anxious and awkward teenaged protagonist trying to cope with some of the more run-of-the-mill adolescent problems related to friendship, sexuality, and drugs. Overall, Dylan's experiences with her peers, while portrayed convincingly in the book, work mainly to amplify the young woman’s main challenge, which is to uncover the truth of what really occurred between her mother and biological father, Mark Wheatcroft years before, when they were almost exactly her age.

Dylan’s emotional response to seeing her father for the first time and her reaction to the difficult request he makes force her to move closer to an acceptance of the fragility of life and the inevitability of death (which preoccupies her throughout the book.) At one point, Dylan observes that the planet’s troubles are so severe that “even if we do everything we can do, it might not be enough.” By the end, though, Dylan seems to recognize the value of one individual to another. Her "hummingbird heart" has exerted itself enough to do the small hopeful bit it can to help one tiny vulnerable part of the planet at least. She is also able to gain some hard-won understanding of where she comes from.

Recommended for ages 14 and up.

I thank Orca Book Publishers for providing me with an advance reading copy of the uncorrected proofs for reviewing purposes(less)

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Jul 03, 2012 Megan rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: young-adult

Sixteen year old Dylan lives on Canada’s west coast with her mother, Amanda, and her adopted younger sister, Karma. She has never met her father; the only thing she knows about him is that his first name is Mark. Dylan finally gets the chance to meet Mark when he gets in touch with Amanda. She soon learns that his four year old daughter, Casey, has leukemia and needs a bone marrow transplant. Mark wants Dylan to get tested as a donor. Because they are half siblings there is a small chance that s...more

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Mar 14, 2012 Coranne (The Best Books Ever) rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: finished-need-review

The cover: I like this cover. I think it is simple and striking compared to other covers that are out on the market right now. I like that it looks like a tattoo and that it ties into the story well. I really have nothing negative to say about the cover- it is very pretty. Another publisher (Penguin) has a YA title coming out this summer with a very similar cover, even the hummingbird tattoo. I wonder if that is just coincidence (it wouldn't surprise me).

The characters: I really struggled with t...more The cover: I like this cover. I think it is simple and striking compared to other covers that are out on the market right now. I like that it looks like a tattoo and that it ties into the story well. I really have nothing negative to say about the cover- it is very pretty. Another publisher (Penguin) has a YA title coming out this summer with a very similar cover, even the hummingbird tattoo. I wonder if that is just coincidence (it wouldn't surprise me).

The characters: I really struggled with the characters. I felt sympathetic for Dylan and for the struggles that she was facing, but I didn't like her very much. To be honest, with the exception of Karma and Dylan's dad and his family- I didn't really like ANY of the characters. It wasn't that they felt fake or flimsy- the characters were complete. The choices that they made made me angry! Every single character in this book was a "hot mess". I was hoping that someone normal would come along and save me from the craziness.

The story: I am incredibly conflicted about this story. On one hand- I really did enjoy this story. It was absolutely fascinating look at what it like for a girl to finally meet her real father after 16 years and the emotions that go through that meeting and developing a relationship. But this is not the first book I have read where every single teen is smoking pot, getting high, getting drunk, and having sex every night. Now I get that teens today are doing more, but really? This book was EXTREME. Am I really that disconnected from the world? The way this book was written- it made it sound like if you were a virgin or someone who didn't get trashed or high you were abnormal. Do I have any teen followers? Is this really true? I admit, I am almost 30, but I really am tired about reading about teens that are train wrecks waiting to happen. (But then again, maybe I am too stodgy). There are numerous mentions of sex in this book, drug use is a prevalent theme, and there are many mentions of getting drunk and of alcoholics, and one pregnancy scare. This was a good book, but not an uplifting one at all.

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Apr 23, 2012 Michelle rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: first-reads, own, young-adult

So I thought I'd start of my first ever First Reads review by saying how much I love, love, LOVE the cover of this book. Being in the graphic design industry, I know how important book covers are for sales. 100% of people have, at one point or another in their lives, judged a book by it's cover, and I won't lie, I did enter the contest to win the book based on the cover as well. I have bought many books based on that decision alone and sometimes I enjoy the stories and sometimes I don't. The typ...more

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Feb 29, 2012 Linda rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: family-relationships, father-daughter, friendship, realistic-fiction, unwed-parents, ya

Sixteen year old Dylan has never met her father. Now, out of the blue, he has contacted her and asked her to be a bone marrow donor for his other daughter, Casey, who is 4 years old and suffering from a form of leukemia. Dylan lives with her mother, Amanda, and her adopted sister, Karma in near poverty. She discovers that her mother has been lying to her for years about her father and more and now she doesn't know how she feels or who to trust.

This is a well-written story about a teenager being...more

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May 17, 2012 Mel Raschke added it

Eternally pessimistic 16-year-old Dylan assesses the world and finds it terribly lacking. She despairs over the environment, winces at the behavior of her too-young mother, and resents the intrusion of her best friend’s boyfriend. At the core of her bleak outlook is the knowledge that her father, aka the “sperm donor,” has never tried to contact her. And then he calls. The tension this creates between Dylan and her mother is brutal and realistic. Dylan has found emotional safety in keeping dista...more

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Mar 13, 2012 Dexter/Persy rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: genreless, tragedy

I really wanted to like this book because the cover is so beautiful, but it's quite possibly the most depressing book ever. The only thing Dylan ever does is moan about how alone she is, about how she wishes her mother didn't have so many tattoos or smoke pot, about how her best friend abandons her for her boyfriend, about how she knows nothing about her father, and about the ozone layer and pollution. The girl needs to chill out.

And then Mark, her father, abruptly tries to reconnect and Dylan t...more

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Jul 04, 2012 Michelle (FabbityFabBookReviews) rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: read-young-adult

This is the second novel by Canadian YA author Robin Stevenson that I have read, and I am growing enamored of her writing. Last year I read Escape Velocity, and was immediately taken in by Stevenson's writing style, the Canadian settings, and the rawness of that story. Hummingbird Heart is likewise uninhibited, intense, and compassionately written.

Dylan has been brought up on Vancouver Island by her young mother; a regular drinker, one-time heavy drug user, and serial dater of not-so-good men. D...more

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Jun 13, 2012 Alma Ramos-McDermott rated it 3 of 5 stars

I liked the interesting dilemmas sixteen-year-old Dylan faces as the author takes readers to deeper levels of thinking and compassion. Along with having to deal with a pot-smoking, freethinking, tattoo-filled mother, Dylan meets a father she never knew existed, struggles with whether or not to become a bone marrow donor for a half sister she never met, wonders whether to have sex with her first boyfriend, and tries to hold on to a friendship that seems to be crumbling right in front of her eyes....more

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Mar 13, 2012 Jenny rated it 5 of 5 stars

Soooo good!! It really shows just how much family means to a person and tells us that sometimes, one should have a little more faith in people.

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Dec 06, 2012 Naomi rated it 4 of 5 stars

I don't read non-fiction often so the amount that I enjoyed this book was surprising! It had good character appeal and I just enjoyed it so much. I'd say I want a sequel but honestly the ending was perfect.

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Aug 08, 2012 Sally rated it 3 of 5 stars

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