"FREEING FINCH"--From Ginny Rorby, the author of Hurt Go Happy, winner of ALA’s Schneider Family Book Award, comes Freeing Finch, the inspiring story of a transgender girl and a stray dog who overcome adversity to find love, home, and a place to belong.

Freeing Finch

From Ginny Rorby, the author of Hurt Go Happy, winner of ALA's Schneider Family Book Award, comes Freeing Finch, the inspiring story of a transgender girl and a stray dog who overcome adversity to find love, home, and a place to belong.

When her father leaves and her mother passes away soon afterward, Finch can't help feeling abandoned. Now she's stuck living with her stepfather and his new wife. They're mostly nice, but they don't believe the one true thing Finch knows about herself: that she's a girl, even though she was born in a boy's body.

Thankfully, she has Maddy, a neighbor and animal rescuer who accepts her for who she is. Finch helps Maddy care for a menagerie of lost and lonely creatures, including a scared, stray dog who needs a family and home as much as she does. As she earns the dog's trust, Finch realizes she must also learn to trust the people in her life--even if they are the last people she expected to love her and help her to be true to herself.

Reviews

 

“Note to readers: get tissues ready―there couldn’t have been more tears!”―Booklist Reader

“No matter their gender identity, young readers will identify with Finch’s struggle to find the relationships she needs to heal her grief and to be who she knows she is in a sometimes scary world. Finch discovers, in her struggle to find the support she needs after her loving mother dies, that forcing the connections we think we need can make us miss the special ones we already have. Finch’s story is Higher Power of Lucky meets Shiloh.”―Tim Capehart, children’s librarian and head of youth services at Dayton Metro Library, author of Shadowangel and Summer Stranger than Fiction, and two-time Newbery Medal selection committee member 


 

Hurt Go Happy

Thirteen-year-old Joey Willis is used to being left out of conversations. Though she's been deaf since the age of six, Joey's mother has never allowed her to learn sign language. She strains to read the lips of those around her, but often fails.

Everything changes when Joey meets Dr. Charles Mansell and his baby chimpanzee, Sukari. Her new friends use sign language to communicate, and Joey secretly begins to learn to sign. Spending time with Charlie and Sukari, Joey has never been happier. She even starts making friends at school for the first time. But as Joey's world blooms with possibilities, Charlie's and Sukari's choices begin to narrow--until Sukari's very survival is in doubt.

PRAISE FOR HURT GO HAPPY:

“This has the potential to be a classic animal story with wide appeal. It is a
heartbreaker…. Rorby successfully gets to the core of a moving animal-human
relationship.”―KLIATT, starred review 4Q, 3P, M, J

“This unusual and emotional story will intrigue animal lovers and those looking for a gripping family drama. It is a thought-provoking addition for school and public library collections.” ―VOYA

“The writing shines when Rorby focuses on what is her true passion: Sukari and the fate of chimpanzees like her.” ―School Library Journal



Ginny Rorby



"I was raised in Winter Park, Florida, where we lived on a lake. I think it was a Purple gallinule who sparked my interest in wildlife and eventually my love of all animals with the exception of palmetto bugs (big roaches.) Purple gallinules look a little like coots, but are purplish blue, have yellow legs, long toes and a beak the color of candy corn. This one, named Big Foot, came back every summer for five years, padding in and out of our kitchen at will for handouts. After high school and a failed attempt at being a bank teller, I moved to Miami and went to work as a flight attendant for National Airlines. In 1980, Pan American Airways bought that company and I worked for them for another 9 years. About midway through my flying career I came to my senses and realized that if I was ever going to do anything else, I needed an education. At age 33, I enrolled in the University of Miami to pursue an undergraduate degree in biology, specializing in ornithology--the study of birds. It was an accidental encounter with an abandoned dog that launched my 'writing career.' After taking eight years to finish my undergraduate studies, I went to graduate school and received an MFA in Creative Writing from Florida International University. My goal then became to move someplace where I would never be hot again. I now live on the chilly coast of northern California with my thirty-five year-old parrot and two cats. I share my three-acre, forested space, as graciously as I can, with skunks, possums, raccoons, an occasional black bear and a mountain lion. A single (and I hope it stays that way) Little Brown bat has lived in the rafters of bathroom for the last five years sleeping (thankfully) directly above the sink. I wouldn't want to hurt my parrot's feelings, but I think my favorite pet of all time was an albino Red Rat snake named Rosie. If I could come back as an animal I would like to return as a Turkey vulture. Some one else kills your food for you and the rest of the time you get to ride thermals of warm air with your friends. Being a bird and flying with friends, what more could one ask for?"

https://www.ginnyrorby.org/