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    Summer Sanctuary
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    Summer Sanctuary
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    Summer Sanctuary
    Ebook163 pages2 hours

    Summer Sanctuary

    By Laurie Gray

    4/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    Matthew knows that this summer is going to be the worst ever. His best friend Kyle is gone, his younger brother Mark has surpassed him in size and athletic ability, and his mother is pregnant for the fifth time. The eldest home-schooled son of a preacher, Matthew plans to bury himself in books about the speed of light and Einstein's Theory of Relativity to see if he can prove his own theory about the dilation of time. Instead, he befriends Dinah, a homeless teenager seeking refuge at the library. Although from very different backgrounds, Matthew and Dinah come to realize that they have a great deal in common--their love for music and for cans of olives and potato chips found in a supermarket dumpster that are just past the sell-by date... and maybe even for each other. Matthew struggles with his feelings for his own family as he helps Dinah avoid Child Welfare. And in the process, Dinah helps him discover that even the smallest acts of kindness can make a very big difference.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherIndependent Publishers Group
    Release dateMay 1, 2010
    ISBN9781935462217
    Unavailable
    Summer Sanctuary

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    Reviews for Summer Sanctuary

    4/5

    9 ratings4 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Laurie Gray's Summer Sanctuary is a wonderfully moving story in which both the shy and studious Matthew and the worldly and tomboyish Dinah grow up so much in just a few short weeks. Matthew meets Dinah, whom he originally thought was a boy, at the library, when she takes his half-eaten lunch out of the trash can and eats it. He's watching from a window inside the library. While Matthew is intrigued by this girl who has eaten from the trash, Dinah is extremely hesitant to tell her story the first time they talk, but by the next day, she obviously needs someone to confide in – and Matthew seems like he can keep a secret.Dinah, waiting on her mother to get out of a stint in jail, leaves the apartment they share with her mother's boyfriend after he asks Dinah to replace her mother in the bedroom. She has no place to go, so she's been sleeping wherever she can lay her head down. Matthew's father is the preacher of the nearby church, and he has an idea that Dinah can sleep in the church basement at night, and leave early each morning. Of course Dinah likes the idea since her other option is to sleep outside in the park.Dinah teaches Matthew how she has been able to survive for the past 10 days on her own, outside. He's a friend when she needs one the most – who won't tell his parents and get child services involved. She's there to encourage him when he's feeling depressed over his friend being gone for the summer and his mother being pregnant – for the fifth.He's the piano player who has taken lessons to be as good as he is. She's the harmonicist who can't read music and is able to play by ear. He's the 13-year old homeschooled student who has decided to study “time dilation and the speed of light” over the summer. She's the homeless girl who expresses her emotions through poetry.Neither of them is the same person by the end of the summer.Matthew and Dinah's story is a beautiful and touching one. The story is a well-written one and describes some of the feelings that teenagers have about their family, and about what it means to be a friend. The kids have different backgrounds and would never have met if not for Dinah's hunger and Matthew's lunch at the library.
    • 4/5
      Facing a summer without his best friend, Matthew decided on a summer project using the speed of light and the theory of relativity to try and prove his own theory about the dilation of time. Using the library resources on a daily basis to prove his theory, he met a girl that turns out didn’t really have anyplace to live or anyone to watch over her for a while. Sharing lunch with Dinah everyday, he would bring sandwiches and she would contribute anything she could find, even if it came from the supermarket dumpster. Wanting to help, he found a way to get her a warm, dry and safe place to stay - in his church basement. Discovering a friend who had a different back ground, a different family dynamic and outlook on life was one way for them both to grow and learn about thing from astrophysics to poetry, from each other and from themselves.The tenderness and the acceptance that these kids show each other is very touching. If only there were more people that could be so different from each other and yet still help one another learn from those differences. This is a quick and easy story to read, it did have a lot of sitting around a tree talking, some religious overtones (Matthews father is a preacher), a little science and even some music. These kids are gentle and kind, they show warmth and encouragement and all of this in a young, pre-teen boy who is finding his own heart full of friendship and good will toward someone he has only just met. Sad is some parts but over all an uplifting story that could be read by any age group. The science gets a bit technical in places and then the end is abrupt, leaving just a small piece of me wondering if that was it.
    • 4/5
      This is a great book for middle-grade readers. It has a lot of heart and a great deal of soul, and author Laurie Gray throws in her gentle humor at no extra charge.
    • 3/5
      My Take: I really enjoyed this book. I was curious about it when I first read the summary because I homeschool my daughter and homeschooled my two older children all the way through school. Beside a few spots where the author made Matthew a little naive ( seemed that he was that way because of his being homeschooled, Most homeschooled children that I know are more away of the entire world than the average child their age) I thought that the author portrayed a homeschooled child very well.I was touched my how willing that Matthew was to watch after Dinah and how he tried to come up with solutions to her problems. They made a fine team. I was disappointed that he felt he needed to hide Dinah from his parents because I am sure that something could have been worked out that she wouldn't of had to go into child welfare. Over all I thought this was a very enjoyable books and I am going to give it to my daughter to read next.