Match the Newbery Plot: Part 9 Quiz

Answer: Bridge to Terabithia

Jess is a bit of an outcast at school. He makes friends with the new girl Leslie, a free-spirited girl who is also unpopular. They invent a fantasy world, Terabithia, which is accessed by swinging across a creek on a rope. The book takes a dark turn when Leslie tries to go there by herself one day.

Katherine Paterson, who won her first Medal for this 1977 book, said that she didn't intentionally base the name of the fantasy world on Terebinthia from C.S. Lewis's "The Chronicles of Narnia", but likely had seen the name and subconsciously altered it for her book.

Answer: Kira-Kira

Cynthia Kadohata won the 2005 Newbery Medal for this book. The term "kira-kira" means glittering in Japanese. Katie and Lynn are Japanese-American sisters living in the American south in the 1950s. Katie struggles to find the "kira-kira" in life when her sister first starts growing away from her, then develops lymphoma.

Answer: Missing May

Summer lives with her Aunt May and Uncle Ob. When May dies suddenly, Ob becomes depressed and thinks he's being visited by her spirit. He and Summer go on a road trip to find a medium to help them communicate with May. This short 1992 book was written by Cynthia Rylant.

Answer: The Higher Power of Lucky

Lucky lives in a small desert town with her dog HMS Beagle. She tries to seek her higher power, something she overheard while eavesdropping on addiction recovery meetings. Since her mother died, she's been living with her father's ex-wife Brigitte, and Lucky's constantly afraid that Brigitte will abandon her.

This 2006 book was written by Susan Patron. I vastly preferred Laura Schlitz's "A Drowned Maiden's Hair" from that year, which didn't even get a Newbery Honor.

Answer: Walk Two Moons

Salamanca Tree Hiddle takes to the road with her grandparents to find her missing mother in Sharon Creech's 1994 book. The title comes from a proverb saying to never judge a man until you've walked two moons in his moccasins. To be honest, I completely forgot everything in this book the day after I finished it--I just didn't find it memorable.

Answer: A Gathering of Days

The full title of this 1979 winner by Joan Blos is "A Gathering of Days: A New England Girl's Journal, 1830-32". Catherine, a young teenager, records her daily life, from normal school occurrences to helping an escaped slave and mourning her friend's death.

Answer: Summer of the Swans

Betsy Byars won for this 1970 book. Sara's having the worst summer of her life, and it gets worse when her brother Charlie, who has been mentally handicapped since having a fever at age three, goes missing.

On a personal note, a Newbery Honor book that year, Sylvia Engdahl's "Enchantress from the Stars", is one of my favorite books. I'm rather disappointed that, with its characters, unique storytelling style, and effective mix of sci-fi, fantasy, and philosophy, it was passed over for the Medal.

Answer: The Crossover

"The Crossover" is a novel in verse. Written by Kwame Alexander in 2014, the book follows twin brothers, Jordan and Josh, who play basketball at school and have various arguments. Their dad used to play basketball and now has heart problems. The sequel is called "Rebound".

Answer: Up a Road Slowly

Julie, at age seven, is sent to live in the country with her aunt when her mother dies. The book follows her life until she graduates high school, at which point she can choose to stay in the country or move to live with her father. Irene Hunt's book was published in 1966.

Answer: Dicey's Song

"Dicey's Song" (1982) by Cynthia Voight is the sequel to "Homecoming", in which siblings are abandoned by their mother near a mall. Dicey and her siblings now live with their grandmother, though Dicey, the oldest, is having trouble letting Grandma take care of them all. Grandma is grappling with her past, which she refuses to talk about, while the children's mother is catatonic.

This was the last Newbery Medal book I read in my read-through. Of course, it won't be the last I ever read--there's a new winner every year, after all!