Rain Tonight: A Story of Hurricane Hazel - Softcover

Steve Pitt was born in Weston, Ontario on October 15th, 1954 – the night Hurricane Hazel devastated Southern Ontario. He has been fascinated by the storm ever since. He has been a writer for twenty-five years, during which time he has also worked as a youth outreach worker, a goose rancher, a gold prospector in the Yukon, an armored truck guard, and resort cook. He holds a Master of Divinity degree, two black belts in tae kwon do, and is currently studying to be a chef. His articles have appeared in Canadian Family, Healthwatch, Rotunda, Legion Magazine, The Globe and Mail, and Stitches Magazine. This is Steve Pitt’s first book.

Grade 2-5–Pitt recounts the story of Hurricane Hazel's deadly 1954 pass over a small town near Toronto, Canada. His narrative follows the fortunes of second-grader Penny Doucette and her family as floodwaters rise into the second story of their house and they are forced to seek refuge on the roof in the howling wind and rain. Terrified, they watch as a neighbor's house is swept from its foundations, and pray that a small rescue boat will reach them before their own home is torn loose. Average-quality, black-and-white drawings appear throughout. The Doucettes' luck in surviving is also reinforced by the period photos that recorded the devastation of a once-comfortable community. Fact boxes appear throughout, but some of the damage data is no longer valid following the multiple storms of fall 2004. While not an essential purchase, this title could provide a personal view to a unit grounded in such stellar works as Patricia Lauber's Hurricanes: Earth's Mightiest Storms (Scholastic, 1996) and Seymour Simon's Hurricanes (HarperCollins, 2003), or reinforce the impact of Victoria Sherrow's more tightly focused Hurricane Andrew: Nature's Rage (Enslow, 1998).–Patricia Manning, formerly at Eastchester Public Library, NY
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