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Hippie Chick
After her sailboat capsizes, fifteen-year-old Lolly Emmerson is rescued by manatees and taken to a mangrove key in the Everglades, where she forms a bond with her aquatic companions while struggling to survive.
156 pages, Hardcover
First published October 1, 2008
About the author
Joseph Monninger
42 books224 followersJoseph Monninger was an American writer and Professor of English at Plymouth State University. He lived in Warren, New Hampshire.
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Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews
October 31, 2008
Reviewed by Sally Kruger aka "Readingjunky" for TeensReadToo.com
If I heard someone else say this about a book, I would immediately roll my eyes and decide to skip reading it, but here goes ... HIPPIE CHICK is a beautiful book! Seriously, if you have a chance to read it, run, don't walk, and grab the chance.
Lolly Emmerson is an independent fifteen-year-old who sets out for an evening sail in the Florida Keys. She leaves a note for her mother as her neighbor suggests and heads out in the small boat she has handled by herself on countless sails. This time events conspire against her when the boat hits some underwater wreckage, causing it to overturn. Lolly is thrown overboard with only her life vest for support.
After hours of struggling and a bump against her leg that she is sure is a bull shark, Lolly manages to climb onto the floundering boat. Her fragile hold on the disabled craft doesn't last long, and she slips back into the water, and what she believes to be certain death.
As Lolly beautifully relates her story, she describes the arrival of three manatees. One of the huge, gentle creatures allows her to cling to him as they make their way to a feeding area in a tiny mangrove bay. Lolly credits the manatees with her eventual survival, but once rescued, she finds it difficult to relate her curious adventure to news reporters and interested friends.
Many authors of survivor tales focus on frightening, desperate attempts to beat nature and hang on until help arrives. Joseph Monninger tells this story in a different way. The focus is on the mysterious, sensitive side of nature. Lolly experiences a deep connection to her manatee rescuers that only she can understand. Monninger gives readers a wonderful peek into Lolly's emotional, life-changing experience.
If I heard someone else say this about a book, I would immediately roll my eyes and decide to skip reading it, but here goes ... HIPPIE CHICK is a beautiful book! Seriously, if you have a chance to read it, run, don't walk, and grab the chance.
Lolly Emmerson is an independent fifteen-year-old who sets out for an evening sail in the Florida Keys. She leaves a note for her mother as her neighbor suggests and heads out in the small boat she has handled by herself on countless sails. This time events conspire against her when the boat hits some underwater wreckage, causing it to overturn. Lolly is thrown overboard with only her life vest for support.
After hours of struggling and a bump against her leg that she is sure is a bull shark, Lolly manages to climb onto the floundering boat. Her fragile hold on the disabled craft doesn't last long, and she slips back into the water, and what she believes to be certain death.
As Lolly beautifully relates her story, she describes the arrival of three manatees. One of the huge, gentle creatures allows her to cling to him as they make their way to a feeding area in a tiny mangrove bay. Lolly credits the manatees with her eventual survival, but once rescued, she finds it difficult to relate her curious adventure to news reporters and interested friends.
Many authors of survivor tales focus on frightening, desperate attempts to beat nature and hang on until help arrives. Joseph Monninger tells this story in a different way. The focus is on the mysterious, sensitive side of nature. Lolly experiences a deep connection to her manatee rescuers that only she can understand. Monninger gives readers a wonderful peek into Lolly's emotional, life-changing experience.
January 9, 2009
If you like manatees this is a great story. It has adventure, sailiing, and love all rolled into one book.
March 5, 2009
a good survival story infused with a love for nature, manatees, and some spirituality...exciting story written in a quiet reflective prose that's a page turner...
July 16, 2017
I like the idea behind this book. Disaster girl has miracle epiphany. With Manatees!
I’m not as keen about the way the story develops. 15-year-old Lolly is the hippie chick of the title. And she’s a unique and somewhat unsettling mashup of personality types. Good student. Loves her mom. Interested in reading and writing and preserving the planet. But she’s also hooking up with a 20-year-old hot body boy. No sex, but only because Lolly wants to get that much better at making out first. And her only attraction to this guy is that he likes boats as much as she does, and he happens to have a hot body. As much as I can appreciate Lolly’s candid assessment, this isn’t my favorite protagonist first impression.
Lolly is a veteran sailor, which makes the first person play-by-play of her capsizing that much more believable. She knows what she’s doing, and is smart enough to recognize the mistakes she made.
That makes it tougher when the plot moves from practical to mystical. The manatees appear, Lolly hops aboard, and she spends a lot of time trying to explain how practical she still is, while the implausibilities build. Lolly does what can can to hang on, kind of similar to what I felt in trying to reconcile the scenes. I got myself through without any reading-related injury, so the story’s at least that good.
I’m not as keen about the way the story develops. 15-year-old Lolly is the hippie chick of the title. And she’s a unique and somewhat unsettling mashup of personality types. Good student. Loves her mom. Interested in reading and writing and preserving the planet. But she’s also hooking up with a 20-year-old hot body boy. No sex, but only because Lolly wants to get that much better at making out first. And her only attraction to this guy is that he likes boats as much as she does, and he happens to have a hot body. As much as I can appreciate Lolly’s candid assessment, this isn’t my favorite protagonist first impression.
Lolly is a veteran sailor, which makes the first person play-by-play of her capsizing that much more believable. She knows what she’s doing, and is smart enough to recognize the mistakes she made.
That makes it tougher when the plot moves from practical to mystical. The manatees appear, Lolly hops aboard, and she spends a lot of time trying to explain how practical she still is, while the implausibilities build. Lolly does what can can to hang on, kind of similar to what I felt in trying to reconcile the scenes. I got myself through without any reading-related injury, so the story’s at least that good.
December 23, 2023
Writers are advised not to over or underestimate their readers’ intelligence. Reading gives a visual image, but when one never heard of a cormorant one is left with a big, blank. In my case, my concentration on the story is gone. Even as I read, I am thinking about looking the word up in a dictionary.
Do young adult readers know the word? It might have been helpful, if the teen character had thought or said: “Their webbed feet remind me of ducks with a hawk-like hooked beak. I never saw one of their long necks expand when swallowing fish; think they swallow their prey underwater after their dives.”
A quote: "...hold your hand out at arm's length, with your fingers together, and place it between the horizon and the sun, then each finger represents fifteen minutes."
I do not know if that is true, but interesting tidbit from the novel.
Do young adult readers know the word? It might have been helpful, if the teen character had thought or said: “Their webbed feet remind me of ducks with a hawk-like hooked beak. I never saw one of their long necks expand when swallowing fish; think they swallow their prey underwater after their dives.”
A quote: "...hold your hand out at arm's length, with your fingers together, and place it between the horizon and the sun, then each finger represents fifteen minutes."
I do not know if that is true, but interesting tidbit from the novel.
January 8, 2021
Monninger seems to always grab your heart.
April 2, 2021
Great adventurous, thinking/ learning book for young teens.
April 7, 2010
After spending 5 days in the Everglades, this South Florida adventure story/ coming of age tale set in south Florida, resonated more deeply than it otherwise may have. 16 year-old Lolly embarks on a typical moonlit solo sail, but runs into some atypical weather and complications that leave her stranded, exhausted, and scared that the bump she just felt was from the nose of a shark. Just as all seems lost, a surprising (endangered) hero arrives. With Lolly's first person, past tense narrative, readers need not wonder if Lolly will find a way back to a human population, but Monninger builds in plenty of suspense in the how, the fate of her rescuers, and the impact her adventures have on her relationships, both with people and with nature. Monninger's somewhat one-note, heavy handed storyline survives due to his protagonist, Lolly- the title "Hippie Chick," though tacking that label to her feels like a strained attempt to identify with teen micro-cliques, or that the story was built around a character development exercise, and Monninger didn't bother to change the tale's title. Lolly deserves better. She offers a refreshingly confident young woman full of delightful seeming contradictions that bring her to life: she embraces and enjoys her sexuality without shame, but without abandon, noting that "teens having sex is like trying to fill a swimming pool with the drain open." A short tale with relative innocence, Hippie Chick appeals to a broad age range, 12-18.
June 24, 2009
This short book can be summed up as a mix of Hoot and Nim's Island type material.
A 15 year old girl goes sailing, has an accident, gets saved by a manatee, lives on an island for a few days, and then gets rescued. She becomes famous after being video taped riding on a manatee which then she has things to say about them when she appears on tv talk shows.
With it being a teen book the only drawback I could see is the relationship between the 15 year old and her 20 year old boyfriend. But that also can be positive as in the book nothing more than kissing takes place and the private togetherness comes toward the end but still no sex mentioned and is parent approved. The author handles this in a very good light I think. HE shows the mom's disapproval and then her approval once she gets to know the boyfriend. Also, the two have a real cool relationship in that neither one shows the cligging, don't be with anyone else attitude. They sorta have an adult aspect about it. It also shows how she goes to college. That is a positive aspect also.
Overall, a good book.
A 15 year old girl goes sailing, has an accident, gets saved by a manatee, lives on an island for a few days, and then gets rescued. She becomes famous after being video taped riding on a manatee which then she has things to say about them when she appears on tv talk shows.
With it being a teen book the only drawback I could see is the relationship between the 15 year old and her 20 year old boyfriend. But that also can be positive as in the book nothing more than kissing takes place and the private togetherness comes toward the end but still no sex mentioned and is parent approved. The author handles this in a very good light I think. HE shows the mom's disapproval and then her approval once she gets to know the boyfriend. Also, the two have a real cool relationship in that neither one shows the cligging, don't be with anyone else attitude. They sorta have an adult aspect about it. It also shows how she goes to college. That is a positive aspect also.
Overall, a good book.
January 17, 2014
I didn't realize that this book was for teens until I noticed the sticker from the library. I got the book because I love Jossph Monninger's writing and wanted to read more of his books. I really enjoyed reading this one, loved the setting and the main character, Lolly and learned alot about manatees.
Here is a brief synopsis from Amazon:
15-year-old Lolly (short for Lollipop) Emmerson is a free-spirit, what others call; the hippie child of a hippie woman. Her favorite thing to do is sail her Boston Whaler in the Florida Keys. One night she runs into an underwater obstacle and the boat founders. After Lolly is knocked out and separated from the boat, she realizes that she's done for and accepts her own fate. That's when the manatees arrive.
Hippie Chick is the story of a girl who forges a bond with these amazing creatures that defies the facile explanations others try to impose. It is a story of survival and enlightenment.
Here is a brief synopsis from Amazon:
15-year-old Lolly (short for Lollipop) Emmerson is a free-spirit, what others call; the hippie child of a hippie woman. Her favorite thing to do is sail her Boston Whaler in the Florida Keys. One night she runs into an underwater obstacle and the boat founders. After Lolly is knocked out and separated from the boat, she realizes that she's done for and accepts her own fate. That's when the manatees arrive.
Hippie Chick is the story of a girl who forges a bond with these amazing creatures that defies the facile explanations others try to impose. It is a story of survival and enlightenment.
December 10, 2011
It was disappointing to me that this novel has nothing to do with hippies, but I read it anyway. It should have been titled "Manatee Girl," "Riding the Manatee," "Swimming with the Manatees," "Song of the Manatee," "Siren Song of the Sea," or something. Basically Lolly, the fifteen-year-old protagonist, is shipwrecked in her sailboat and recused by manatees. The author does his best to make the romance between Lolly and twenty-year-old Nick appealing, but I just was thinking it was an opportunity for statutory rape. The language is beautiful, even poetic, but Lolly's voice sounds like an sagacious aging monk. This is one soulful book. The epilogue goes on too long, over two years with too many events after the story has ended. Lovers of sea creatures and sea adventures will enjoy this book.
January 23, 2011
This book made me cry. It's a beautifully written book about survival and our ancient bond with animals. Neither the title (which truly dates the book and has little to do with the plot) or the cover do it justice. I doubt I would have picked this book off a shelf without seeing a review on Goodreads. But it's a wonderful story of a 15 year old girl who goes sailing one evening and doesn't return. With alternating scenes between those on the dock implementing a search, and Lolly's minute-by-minute struggle to stay alive, this book has a spiritual quality about it without ever resorting to fantasy. I loved it, and was very moved. And I know next to nothing about manatees, but now I want to know more. Good book!
July 28, 2011
I saw this book when I was shelving in YA fiction and decided to read it. The story follows Lolly, the daughter of a hippie living in Florida. Lolly has an old Boston Whaler boat that she loves to sail near her house. One evening she goes out for what was supposed to be an hour long sail, but her boat hits something submerged in the water and it capsizes. Lolly is knocked unconcious and when she wakes up she is far away from her boat. She feels certain this could be the end, but then a group of manatees comes up and carries her away to a hot spring. Lolly spends a few days with the manatees before being rescued and forms a deep bond with them. I thought the premise seemed interesting and I LOVE manatees too. The book is pretty short and I read it over the course of just one day.
July 25, 2014
Story about a girl named Lolly who is left adrift on the sea after a boating accident. She encounters three manatees and manages to survive with their help. This is a nice, quiet story with a strong female character.
November 14, 2014
When Lolly Emmerson's boat runs aground in the Everglades, she is injured and stranded. She is rescued by manatees. The descriptions of the natural world, and Lolly's relationship with the manatees are beautiful. The book is not at all what the title seems to suggest.
February 24, 2009
Fast read, no language, some mentions of sex.
May 9, 2009
this was a fun and quick read.
August 28, 2009
a good survival story infused with a love for nature, manatees, and some spirituality...exciting story written in a quiet reflective prose that's a page turner...
March 24, 2010
I didn't think that I was going to like it but i really did! there wasn't to much dialouge but I liked how the author put it together.
August 29, 2010
So far, good.
November 13, 2010
Great book! :) So touching and sweet!
January 27, 2011
Fast read. This is about manatees in Florida, if you are interested. NOT about hippies.
July 20, 2012
Ignore the misleading title. Rescue manatees!
September 6, 2012
A great summer read. And, yes, it's sort of beautiful.
January 24, 2016
This story made me cry
February 15, 2013
Loved this book about manatees and a troubled teen.
Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews