Honors for Second Fiddle
Second Fiddle was chosen as an Indy Next Pick in the spring of 2011. It has been placed on Mock Newbery lists in Oregon and Illinois.
The paperback of Second Fiddle is coming March 13th 2012. Stay tuned for a sneak peak of the new cover!
Honors for Heart of a Shepherd
Heart of a Shepherd has been honored with the Oregon Spirit Book Award which is given by the Oregon Council of Teachers of English. This puts me in the company of two previous winners for whom I have enormous respect, Susan Fletcher, who won for Alphabet of Dreams and David Gifaldi who was honored for Listening for Crickets.
It was my pleasure to be the guest of the Los Angeles Chapter of the Women’s National Book Association in June. They made Heart of a Shepherd an Honor Book for their Judy Lopez Memorial Book Award. Thank you ladies, you are an inspiration!
Heart of a Shepherd has received the Rodda Award from the Church and Synagogue Library Association. I’m thrilled to be honored in this way and in particular when the field of nominees contained many books I admire. I’ll be in Houston to accept this award July 25th, 2010.
Heart of a Shepherd was also on the Best Children’s Book of the Year list at the Washington Post and Kirkus Reviews. It was on the Hornbook Fanfare list.
Local honors for my book included being on the Beaverton School districts Newbery Club list which meant I was able to visit many Newbery Clubs nearby. It was great fun and I learned a lot from all those wonderful avid-readers. In the 2010/2011 school year, Heart of a Shepherd will be in the Oregon Battle of the Books!
HEART OF A SHEPHERD received its first starred review from Kirkus and a second starred review from Hornbook Magazine!
Kirkus, 1 December 2008
(STARRED) Parry, Rosanne HEART OF A SHEPHERD
Sixth-grader Ignatius—he goes by “Brother”—faces a hard year as his father is deployed to Iraq, and he, the youngest of five boys, is left with his aging grandparents to manage the family ranch in Oregon. The episodic presentation, with each chapter a vignette from one of the months his father is gone, effectively portrays the seasonal changes of farm life. The spare, evocative language of his first-person narration immediately captures readers’ interest and never falters in describing a year in the life of this eminently likable boy trying hard to be the man of the house, facing up to one believable challenge after another. From raising orphaned lambs he names after hobbits to delivering a calf to rescuing a farmhand and the stock from a raging prairie fire, each event moves Brother toward a new sense of his own emotional strength. At once a gripping coming-of-age novel and a celebration of rural life, quiet heroism and the strength that comes from spirituality, this first novel is an unassuming, transcendent joy. (Fiction. 10 & up)
Hornbook Magazine, May/June 2009
Parry, Rosanne
HEART OF A SHEPHERD
With his artist mother living in Italy, his four older brothers away at school or in the service, and now his Army-Reserve father off to serve an extended tour in Iraq, sixth-grader Ignatius (thankfully nicknamed Brother) is the only one left to help his grandparents run the family ranch. “I get to thinking about the long line of soldiers that have marched away from this table, which is great if you’re the patriotic type. But it’s not so great if you are the one waiting for your dad to come home.” Distinctively set in the cattle and sheep country of eastern Oregon, this first novel chronicles Brother’s year of hard work (lambing, calving), danger (a rattlesnake, a fire), worry about his father’s safety, and pondering what direction his own future will take. (The conclusion he comes to is surprising only because we haven’t seen anything like it in children’s books in quite a long time.) Brother’s honest voice conveys an emotional terrain as thoughtfully developed as Parry’s evocation of the Western landscape. r.s.
Awards and Reviews:
- Kirkus Reviews Best Books of the Year 2009
- Horn Book Fanfare Best Books of 2009
- Washington Post Best Children’s Books of 2009
- ABC Best Books for Chidren 2009
- Starred review from Hornbook Magazine, May/June 2009. Read the full review here.
- Starred review from Kirkus, December 1st 2008. Read the full review here.
- Publishers Weekly Flying Start Author 2009
- Indy Next Pick spring of 2009
- 2010 Rodda Award given by the Church and Synagogue Library Association
- 2010 Oregon Spirit Award from the Oregon Council of Teachers of English
- Oregon Battle of the Books List for the 2010/11 school year
- Nominated for a Cybil award in Middle Grade fiction– an award chosen by children’s book bloggers
- 2010 Capital Choices Notable Book for Middle Grade Readers
- 2009-10 nominee for the Nene Award–the children’s choice book award in Hawaii
- 2011-12 nominee for the Volunteer State Children’s Book Award–the children’s choice book award in Tenessee
- 2010 Honor Book for the Judy Lopez Memorial Award given by the Women’s National Book Association
“So full of honor, dignity, and goodness I could hardly hold it all in. This isn’t one of the best books I’ve read this year, it’s one of the best I’ve read in my lifetime. It’s magnificent.”
“A beautiful, kind, even heartwarming novel that does not ever stray from rigorous honesty and clarity. And it is, besides a true evocation of modern ranch life, a life rooted of necessity in community and love, a life seldom written about with such grace and authenticity.”
“Heart of a Shepherd is a perfect book not only for the middle grade reader but for every reader. Isn’t it wonderful that there are books like this—about good people, about striving and about doing the right thing!”
A review from Kirkus – 1 December 2008
(STARRED) Parry, Rosanne
HEART OF A SHEPHERD
Sixth-grader Ignatius—he goes by “Brother”—faces a hard year as his father is deployed to Iraq, and he, the youngest of five boys, is left with his aging grandparents to manage the family ranch in Oregon. The episodic presentation, with each chapter a vignette from one of the months his father is gone, effectively portrays the seasonal changes of farm life. The spare, evocative language of his first-person narration immediately captures readers’ interest and never falters in describing a year in the life of this eminently likable boy trying hard to be the man of the house, facing up to one believable challenge after another. From raising orphaned lambs he names after hobbits to delivering a calf to rescuing a farmhand and the stock from a raging prairie fire, each event moves Brother toward a new sense of his own emotional strength. At once a gripping coming-of-age novel and a celebration of rural life, quiet heroism and the strength that comes from spirituality, this first novel is an unassuming, transcendent joy. (Fiction. 10 & up)
Hornbook Magazine, May/June 2009
(starred) Parry, Rosanne
HEART OF A SHEPHERD
With his artist mother living in Italy, his four older brothers away at school or in the service, and now his Army-Reserve father off to serve an extended tour in Iraq, sixth-grader Ignatius (thankfully nicknamed Brother) is the only one left to help his grandparents run the family ranch. “I get to thinking about the long line of soldiers that have marched away from this table, which is great if you’re the patriotic type. But it’s not so great if you are the one waiting for your dad to come home.” Distinctively set in the cattle and sheep country of eastern Oregon, this first novel chronicles Brother’s year of hard work (lambing, calving), danger (a rattlesnake, a fire), worry about his father’s safety, and pondering what direction his own future will take. (The conclusion he comes to is surprising only because we haven’t seen anything like it in children’s books in quite a long time.) Brother’s honest voice conveys an emotional terrain as thoughtfully developed as Parry’s evocation of the Western landscape. r.s.
A Review from the Washington Post-Book World section 18 January 2009
HEART OF A SHEPHERD By Rosanne Parry Random House. $15.99. (ages 8-12)
When his father is deployed to Iraq, 11-year-old Brother holds tight to his parting words: “A man’s life is not so much about courage. You just have to keep going.” So Brother does his best to “keep going” during Dad’s 14-month absence. He helps his grandparents on the family ranch, raises orphaned lambs and delivers a calf. When a prairie fire threatens their home, the boy not only braves the blaze to rescue stranded sheep but bears loss and starts to rebuild.
Does Brother sound too good to be true? His spunk, occasional self-doubts and cowpoke skills make him a believable, engaging character, as do his clear-eyed observations on schoolmates, church and his chess-playing Grandpa. Brother also explores spiritual issues with a depth and honesty seldom seen in contemporary children’s literature. Rosanne Parry’s first novel is something to celebrate: a big-themed book with a big-hearted boy at the center.
