about the book
Twelve-year-old Willow Chance delights in nothing more than being in nature and studying medical conditions. She is something of a genius for her age, and since genius is often accompanied by eccentricities, Willow finds it comforting to count by sevens. Her brain has often made it difficult to connect to others, but thankfully she has always had her kind, loving, adoptive parents for grounding.
But when her parents are both killed in a car accident, Willow’s already fragile world becomes absolutely shattered. Now it is just her and the world, a world baffling to her and her extraordinary mind.
She has twice now become an orphan, and it drives her towards despair.
Thankfully Willow had managed to make one good friend, in spite of her genius; her friend Mai Nguyen convinces her mother to take Willow in. The Nguyens are not wealthy. Taking on another will stretch their tight budget even thinner. But out of their kindness and their simple love, Willow may yet be brought back from the brink of her despair.
about the author
Holly Goldberg Sloan has had an enigmatic life. She was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, but most of her childhood was spent moving around with her hippie parents.
Her father was a professor and her mother was an architect, and their jobs took them to California, Washington D.C., the Netherlands, Istanbul, and Oregon, to name a few of the places where she lived.
Holly went to college at Wellesley in Massachusetts. After graduating she got a job in New York, but she spent as much time as she could writing (even at work when no one was looking). By the time she was 25 she had moved to Los Angeles and sold her first screenplay. Some of the movies she has done are “Angels in the Outfield,” “Made in America,” and “The Crocodile Hunter Movie” with the late Steve Irwin.
In 1982 she married Chuck Sloan. Together they have two sons, and though their marriage ended after ten years, she and Chuck remained close friends until his death. Now Holly lives in Santa Monica, California, with her new husband Gary Rosen, a writer as well.
The most rewarding thing Holly has done was to complete her first book, I’ll Be There. Her novel about loss, Counting by 7s, is a very personal journey for her. Holly lost her college roommate to cancer and her ex-husband Chuck died suddenly of heart failure while swimming in the ocean. Almost everything that happens in her books has happened to her or to someone she knows.
Aside from writing, Holly loves to cook, watch sports, spend evenings with her family and friends, and walk along the nearby Pacific beach.
Sources:
Author website
Author interview : Penguin Teen
Author interview: Books for Keeps
Author interview: Distraction No. 99
Also by Holly Goldberg Sloan:
Just Call My Name. Little, Brown and Company. 2014.
I’ll Be There. Little, Brown and Company. 2011.
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