ACCESS DIGITIZED EDITION
Guide/Reviews Database
INTERMEDIATE FICTION
Rushby, Allison

The Mulberry Tree

304 pp. | Candlewick | July, 2020 | Trade ISBN 978-1-5362-0761-3 $19.99 | Ebook ISBN 978-1-5362-1187-0 $19.99
(2) 4-6 Immy and her parents have moved from Australia to a quaint English village. Despite the real estate agent's misgivings, the family chooses Lavender Cottage as their new home--a charming little house with a huge, leafless, evil-looking mulberry tree in the garden. It turns out the entire village is superstitious about the tree, and for good reason: two girls who lived in Lavender Cottage went missing on the eve of their eleventh birthdays, and everyone believes that the mulberry tree snatched them. As her own eleventh birthday approaches, Immy becomes determined to solve the mystery of the girls' disappearance. At the same time, she struggles to cope with her dad's severe depression and to make friends in a village that distrusts outsiders. In the end, a compassionate act of Immy's toward the tree reverses, indeed erases, the curse. The novel's premise is spooky, and the descriptions of the tree and the blighted village are vivid. Although the solution to the mulberry-tree mystery is a bit simplistic, there's more than enough conflict to be found in Immy and her family's relationship with the villagers and the mental health struggles her father faces.
Reviewer: Sarah Berman | Horn Book Magazine Issue: November, 2020

RELATED 

INTERMEDIATE FICTION

The Republic of Birds
by Miller, Jessica
INTERMEDIATE FICTION

Atlantis
by Mone, Gregory
INTERMEDIATE FICTION

It Doesn't Take a Genius
by Rhuday-Perkovich, Olugbemisola
INTERMEDIATE FICTION

Cece Rios and the Desert of Souls
by Rivera, Kaela
INTERMEDIATE FICTION

Soul Lanterns
by Kuzki, Shaw
More

Get connected. Join our global community of more than 200,000 librarians and educators.

This coverage is free for all visitors. Your support makes this possible.

We are currently offering this content for free. Sign up now to activate your personal profile, where you can save articles for future viewing.

ALREADY A SUBSCRIBER?