Someone to Count on - Softcover

Grade 5-7-Samantha's mother, Elizabeth, is a free spirit,"...blown like a leaf on a breeze." Her 11-year-old daughter wants only to stay put and have someone she can count on. Widowed and estranged from her father, Elizabeth is a dilettante who refuses responsibility and moves from apartment to apartment, always seeking something new. Sam is the adult by default. When Elizabeth announces that they will be heading for Colorado to her father's ranch, the child hopes against hope that they will find a home. In the traditional sense, it is. But when Elizabeth is ready to move on, Sam must determine what home really means to her, and in the end decides she belongs with her mother. Vivid characters abound-Sam's grandfather, his new wife, and Sam's Western companion, Nick, are complex and pleasingly imperfect. The self-centered and remote Elizabeth, however, is less credibly drawn. Told in the first person, the prose has a sense of immediacy, but much of the plot development is internal as the girl grows toward her resolution. Descriptions of the ranch convey the panorama through her eyes and her fierce affection for the mountains' terrain and wildlife. Though lacking the complexity of the author's Mama Let's Dance (Little, 1991), Someone to Count On shares a distinct regional flavor, compelling characters, and a story line with a bittersweet twist.
Carolyn Noah, Central Mass. Regional Library System, Worcester, MA
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Gr. 5-7. At 11, Samantha ("Sam") longs for a settled home and friends; but her single-parent mother, Elizabeth, is always looking for new places, rushing off to try something novel, always moving. When Elizabeth suddenly decides to return to her father's ranch in Colorado, it at first seems as if Sam's dreams have come true. She has never known her grandfather, but despite his grouchiness, the two warm to each other. He sees that she loves the ranch, and they share a love of books. He's married to a warm, cozy, motherly woman. There's even a boy Sam's age, who teaches her to ride. The ranch life is all too ideal; this doesn't have the heartbreaking tension of Where It Stops, Nobody Knows (1988), Ehrlich's story of a mother and daughter on the run. But the grandfather is drawn with restraint, and Hermes does dramatize Sam's conflicts about the mother she loves but doesn't respect. On the one hand, Sam has a terror of being abandoned by her mother; on the other, Sam longs to leave her mother and stay on the ranch. The relationship with her grandfather reminds her of Heidi, and kids who remember that story will recognize some of the same love and loneliness in Sam. Hazel Rochman