Finalist for the Geoffrey Bilson Award for Historical Fiction for Young People and the IODE Violet Downey Book Award, and an American Library Association Notable Children's Book and a Kirkus Reviews Best Book

It's 1941, and Canada is two years into World War II. Meanwhile, in rural Manitoba, fifteen-year-old Marie-Claire Cote begins a war of her own as she and her brother and sister, all stricken with tuberculosis, are taken by their anguished parents to "chase the cure" at nearby Pembina Hills Sanatorium.

While her roommate retains a dogged cheerfulness that is both heroic and irritating, Marie-Claire resists with all of her prideful strength while she fights her own illness and tries to seek privacy where there is none. Her father, overwhelmed by fear and guilt, never visits. And her young brother, Luc, who is losing his battle with TB in another wing of the infirmary, sends notes to her penned for him by his nineteen-year-old roommate, Jack Hawkings.

This is a story about surviving loss, and finding friendship, and love, in surprising places.

Martha Brooks lives in Winnipeg. Her book Traveling on into the Light was named to the international 1996 IBBY Honour List and is an American Library Association Best Book for Young Adults. Two Moons in August and Paradise Caf and Other Stories were Governor General’s Award nominees; the latter also received the 1991 Boston Globe Horn Book Award for distinguished children’s fiction. When not writing, Martha can be found performing in local jazz clubs. Maureen Hunter is one of Canada’s most successful playwrights. Her work has been produced extensively on Canada’s major stages, in the United States, and Britain, and by CBC and BBC Radio. Atlantis was a finalist for the Governor General’s Award and Transit of Venus, premiered by the Manitoba Theatre Centre, became the first Canadian play ever staged by the Royal Shakespeare Company of Britain. A native of Saskatchewan, Maureen now lives on the banks of the Red River in Winnipeg.

Martha Brooks' profile page

• Commended, YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults
• Commended, ALA Notable Children's Books List
• Short-listed, Manitoba Young Readers Choice Awards
• Short-listed, Geoffrey Bilson Award for Historical Fiction for Young People
• Commended, CCBC Best Books for Kids & Teens, Starred Selection
• Short-listed, Manitoba Book Awards McNally Robinson Book for Young People Award
• Commended, Kirkus Best Teen Books of 2011
• Short-listed, IODE Violet Downey Book Award
• Commended, OLA Best Bets

...[readers] will sympathize with the book's prickly heroine...

Publishers Weekly

Readers will be held by the story’s heartbreaking truths, right to the end

Booklist

Brooks is rather a 'queen of hearts' herself when it comes to the depiction of a girl's adolescent intelligence, annoyance and desire, and here she works her magic once again.

Toronto Star

Much like a play in its discrete, focused scenes, this novel is that rarest of birds, a happily ending, nonsappy young adult romance.

Book Magazine, STARRED REVIEW

Brooks masterfully re-creates a TB sanatorium through the protagonist’s experience and believable characters. A well-drawn, innocent, yet compelling work of historical fiction

School Library Journal, STARRED REVIEW

...Brooks has been called the premier writer for the older adolescent. As great a compliment as that is, I think that sells her short.

Lögberg-Heimskringla

...an emotionally rich, stirring story about loss, friendship, love and healing.

Kirkus Reviews, STARRED REVIEW

...a story of survival and friendship...

Winnipeg Free Press

...a moving portrait of hope.

Quill & Quire

...a careful, graceful novel, robust with sorrow and triumph in equal measure. It will leave the reader with both a chill down the spine and a lump in the throat.

Globe and Mail