Looking at the Moon

Joan Buchanan is a writer, storyteller and instructor and author of
Taking Care of My Cold.

Pearson, a winner of the Mr. Christie Award for children’s writing,
has provided us with the second book in the proposed trilogy that began
with The Sky is Falling. In the first book, the main character, Norah,
travels with her little brother from England to Canada to stay as a
“war guest” during the World War II. She has a rocky start with her
rich and strict guardian, Mrs. Ogilvie.

Looking at the Moon opens three years later, with Norah just having
turned thirteen, and spans her five-week stay at the Ogilvie family
cottage in Ontario’s Muskoka district. She has looked forward to
boating, swimming, and frolicking with her young cousins: previous
summers there have proved idyllic. However, she finds it difficult to
shake “the black cloud of angry misery that had hung over her almost
constantly since she had turned thirteen.”

The author captures the ambivalence of becoming a teenage girl. Norah
yearns to be different and to be one of the crowd at the same time. She
wants to be on her own, yet join in with the Ogilvies and feel welcomed,
too. Her solution is often to read a book on the veranda with an ear to
the conversations in neighboring rooms, or to think and to watch from
her special rock above the lake. She longs for guidance from her far-off
mother or some other grown-up, but she finds most of the adults in the
large Ogilvie clan boring or inaccessible. When 19-year-old cousin
Andrew arrives, Norah is jealous of all the attention he gets and
deliberately ignores him. Then she finds herself falling in love with
him, aware of his every move and thinking of him ceaselessly.

Norah’s character is well developed, and after a slow opening the
book soon becomes absorbing. The plot flows naturally and the setting
appears soundly researched. Many ages will enjoy this story,
particularly 11- to 13-year-olds. I am eager to read more by Pearson.