Lucia Connelly Two Girls, Two Stories

Annotation

In 1936 to 1936 Polly Pierce was an eleven-year-old New Jersey school girl leaving the security of her grandfather's home in Pennsylvania to travel east with her parents. Initially her problems were that of your average seventh grader; adjusting to a new private all-girls school, where she was placed ahead a grade. Polly worried over her studies, friendships, class and racial distinctions. Then like the present day, 1930s Europe cast a long shadow and Polly found herself in the middle of a life-threatening crime where she alone must save a friend and report the truth. Her parents drank, had parties unaware of the treachery right under their noses.Polly was under extraordinary circumstances in a world controlled by adults. In order to do right she lied, stole and snuck around. In the end her bravery went unrewarded, an adult authority figure co-opted it.Set in the early '80s, the second story, Rogo the Magnificent, is about a bloodhound who brings people safely home and Isabella a young autistic girl who manages life with the help of ghosts. At first the ghosts appear as figments of her imagination, later they're sinister. Meanwhile Rogo continues to-do good and Isabella, needing someone safe to love attaches herself to him.