What do you think?
Rate this book
Cheshire Moon
Miranda is deaf and her closest friend Timothy has disappeared at sea. Without him, communication is difficult, often embarrassing, sometimes impossible. Miranda is left alone, alienated, and unsure of herself. Thrown into the company of Boone, a neighbor who helps her aunt keep up the yard, Miranda struggles with her loyalty to Timothy and her desperate need for someone who accepts her on her own terms, as Timothy did. When she and Boone discover they are having the same dreams about a mysterious island and an even more mysterious presence, Miranda must choose between the ideal world Timothy represented and the confusion and pain of the hearing world, opening herself to the risky, awkward relationships that it offers.
- GenresChildrens
106 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1992
About the author
Nancy Butts
3 books16 followersNancy Butts has had her head stuck in a book ever since she learned to read--and she's been writing stories for just as long.
She published her first poem at age ten, and decided after reading Madeleine L'Engle's "A Wrinkle in Time" in fifth grade that she wanted to be a writer, too. But she never thought she was good enough, so by the sixth grade she decided to be an astronomer instead: and after that a lawyer, Congresswoman, spy, and finally a doctor. And if she hadn't gone to Duke University, where she learned that in order to be premed she had to hang out in chemistry lectures with 500 other students, she might be a doctor today. Instead, she took a seminar in Zen Buddhism and decided that spending all her time talking about big ideas in small classes with bearded professors was what college was supposed to be about. She switched her major to religion--with a minor in Russian of all things--happily haunted the stacks of the college library for four years, and when she graduated, had absolutely zero idea what she wanted to do with her life.
So she sat down, read all 88 Agatha Christie mystery novels in two months, took a job in a lab, got married, moved to Georgia, and spent the next six years thinking that she really should have applied to medical school after all. Then she tried PA school instead, had an early mid-life crisis, and when someone asked her what she saw herself doing in ten years, she suddenly remembered what she had known back in fifth grade: she wanted to write.
She quit school, and within a few months she had landed a job as a reporter at a small-town newspaper. She spent the next eleven years working there, writing several stories each week and winning awards. But once her son was born she secretly started to write her first children's book--the story that ultimately became her debut novel, "Cheshire Moon,” which won the respect of members of the deaf community for its portrayal of a young deaf girl who will communicate only in Sign. This book was soon followed by the science fiction novel "The Door in the Lake," was an ALA Quick Pick and a Scholastic Book Club selection.
Since then Nancy spends much of her time working as a creative writing teacher and manuscript editor. Some of the people whose books she's had the privilege of shepherding into the world are Monica Roe, author of the YA novel "Thaw"; Alberto Hazan, author of the YA fantasy series "The League of Freaks"; and Jennifer Lundquist, author of the middle grade novel, "Seeing Cinderella." Nancy has also published several books for the direct-to-school education market, and is the editor of a how-to book on revision entitled "Write it Right!" by the author Sandra Asher.
Then in April 2013 she published her first book for adults: "Spontaneous Combustion: A Writer's Primer for Creative Revival." This book was inspired by the writer's malaise often suffered by her students and clients: and by her own efforts to write her way out of creative drought.
Somewhere during these years she also managed to land a spot as a contestant on the TV game show "Jeopardy" and was a one-day champion.
But writing fiction for kids continues to be her passion, and she is working hard on another middle grade novel set in a sleepy Southern town much like the one where she lives: only with more ghosts.
There is just one ghost in the 130-year-old Victorian cottage where Nancy lives and works: one humming ghost, and far too few electric outlets for the Mac laptops which are her auxiliary brain. When she's not teaching, editing, or trying to carve out time for her own writing, Nancy is an avid walker; and she also likes to grow herbs, make quilts, knit miles and miles of scarves, play the mountain dulcimer and Finnish kantele, be the Mac tech support person for everyone she knows, and tend to her slightly neurotic Newfoundland dog, Yukon.
She published her first poem at age ten, and decided after reading Madeleine L'Engle's "A Wrinkle in Time" in fifth grade that she wanted to be a writer, too. But she never thought she was good enough, so by the sixth grade she decided to be an astronomer instead: and after that a lawyer, Congresswoman, spy, and finally a doctor. And if she hadn't gone to Duke University, where she learned that in order to be premed she had to hang out in chemistry lectures with 500 other students, she might be a doctor today. Instead, she took a seminar in Zen Buddhism and decided that spending all her time talking about big ideas in small classes with bearded professors was what college was supposed to be about. She switched her major to religion--with a minor in Russian of all things--happily haunted the stacks of the college library for four years, and when she graduated, had absolutely zero idea what she wanted to do with her life.
So she sat down, read all 88 Agatha Christie mystery novels in two months, took a job in a lab, got married, moved to Georgia, and spent the next six years thinking that she really should have applied to medical school after all. Then she tried PA school instead, had an early mid-life crisis, and when someone asked her what she saw herself doing in ten years, she suddenly remembered what she had known back in fifth grade: she wanted to write.
She quit school, and within a few months she had landed a job as a reporter at a small-town newspaper. She spent the next eleven years working there, writing several stories each week and winning awards. But once her son was born she secretly started to write her first children's book--the story that ultimately became her debut novel, "Cheshire Moon,” which won the respect of members of the deaf community for its portrayal of a young deaf girl who will communicate only in Sign. This book was soon followed by the science fiction novel "The Door in the Lake," was an ALA Quick Pick and a Scholastic Book Club selection.
Since then Nancy spends much of her time working as a creative writing teacher and manuscript editor. Some of the people whose books she's had the privilege of shepherding into the world are Monica Roe, author of the YA novel "Thaw"; Alberto Hazan, author of the YA fantasy series "The League of Freaks"; and Jennifer Lundquist, author of the middle grade novel, "Seeing Cinderella." Nancy has also published several books for the direct-to-school education market, and is the editor of a how-to book on revision entitled "Write it Right!" by the author Sandra Asher.
Then in April 2013 she published her first book for adults: "Spontaneous Combustion: A Writer's Primer for Creative Revival." This book was inspired by the writer's malaise often suffered by her students and clients: and by her own efforts to write her way out of creative drought.
Somewhere during these years she also managed to land a spot as a contestant on the TV game show "Jeopardy" and was a one-day champion.
But writing fiction for kids continues to be her passion, and she is working hard on another middle grade novel set in a sleepy Southern town much like the one where she lives: only with more ghosts.
There is just one ghost in the 130-year-old Victorian cottage where Nancy lives and works: one humming ghost, and far too few electric outlets for the Mac laptops which are her auxiliary brain. When she's not teaching, editing, or trying to carve out time for her own writing, Nancy is an avid walker; and she also likes to grow herbs, make quilts, knit miles and miles of scarves, play the mountain dulcimer and Finnish kantele, be the Mac tech support person for everyone she knows, and tend to her slightly neurotic Newfoundland dog, Yukon.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
November 8, 2013
This book is amazingly moving! It is about a girl who is deaf and the only person that treats her as a hearing person is her cousin, who is also her best friend. She goes to Summerhaven every summer to visit her cousin. One year, after she came home, she discovered that her cousin has drowned. The next summer, she starts having odd dreams due to the Cheshire Moon. A new neighbor is having the same dreams as her! Together they try to be kind, figure each other out, and figure out the mystery of the Cheshire Moon's dreams. Reading this book, I have discovered that being deaf can be really hard. I also learned that you shouldn't feel so bad for you, but for other people. I think, that no matter what your genre is, this is a great book to read!
July 1, 2014
I haven't read a young adult book in years, but this happens to be the one other novel by the author of my favorite book from my teen years, The Door in the Lake. The Door in the Lake captivated and moved me as a teen and I've never forgotten it.
This book was equally as beautiful, moving, and heartfelt. It can be difficult to review a young adult book as an adult, the style is simpler, the themes more pronounced, but I felt I owed this book the chance. I am glad that I did.
Loss and friendship are the prominent themes, and the author's ability to weave sign language into the conversation was stirring.
This book was equally as beautiful, moving, and heartfelt. It can be difficult to review a young adult book as an adult, the style is simpler, the themes more pronounced, but I felt I owed this book the chance. I am glad that I did.
Loss and friendship are the prominent themes, and the author's ability to weave sign language into the conversation was stirring.
January 24, 2014
My Instructors brilliance here convinced me to take her writing instruction. Nancy thanks for your kind words. You promised a sequel.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews