false 76136546 837382 11564 1416524290 9781416524298 466 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166480184m/11564.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11564.The_Girl_Who_Loved_Tom_Gordon 3.35 9777 The world had teeth and it could bite you with them anytime it wanted. Trisha McFarland discovered this when she was nine years old. Lost in the woods. Trying not to be terrified, trying not to let herself think that sometimes when people got lost in the woods, they got seriously hurt. Sometimes they died.

Trisha McFarland has only veered off the trail to get away from the bickering of her brother and recently divorced mother. She doesn't think there's any chance of losing her way.

Except, in her panic to get back on the path, Trisha takes a turning that leads into the tangled undergrowth. Deeper and deeper into the terrifying woods. At first it's just the midges and mosquitoes, hanging around her ears like helicopters, trying to drink her blood and sip her sweat. Then the hunger. For solace she tunes her Walkman into broadcasts of the Red Sox baseball games and the performances of her hero Tom Gordon. And when the reception begins to fade, Trisha imagines that Tom Gordon is with her.

As darkness begins to fall, Trisha begins to give up hope of being found. Alive. And as she struggles for survival and a way out, she realises that she's not alone. There's something else in the woods - watching. Waiting...

A classic story that engages our emotions at the most primal level. The Girl who Loved Tom Gordon explores our deep dread of the unknown and the extent to which faith can conquer it. Aglow with a girl's indomitable spirit, it is at once a powerful fairytale, an astounding allegory, and a brilliant contemporary portrait of a girl and her sports hero.]]> 3389 3.75 732977 32883 0 0 false Fri Oct 23 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Thu Oct 29 12:51:56 -0700 2009 Thu Oct 29 13:10:05 -0700 2009 1
The story is about a nine-year-old girl who gets lost in the woods. King's trademark metaphysical nonsense gets in the way of the psychological scariness of her story of survival, but since the protagonist is a kid, it feels plausible that her imagination could be responsible for these embellishments.

The story is set in the northeast U.S. in 1998, and it feels somewhat dated, but since I grew up there and then, it also feels very real. Oh, and I really don't like baseball, or any sports, and this is a story about a girl who's obsessed with the Red Sox. Even so, I liked it. So kudos to King for that, too.]]>