SING AND SCATTER DAISIES

by Louise Lawrence ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 1977

In this return to Wyndcliffe (1975) nearly twenty years later, John Hollis, the spirit visible to select children, again meddles in Hennessy family life. Nicky, a prickly seventeen-year-old guitarist who adamantly rejects bourgeois options, leaves London for grandmother's Wyndcliffe property as soon as he overhears that Aunt Anna--his special favorite--has retreated there, dying of cancer. One afternoon Hollis appears to Nicky and his babbling cousin Debbie; later he reveals his own murky past, huddles with Nicky about the boy's future, and finally asks him to arrange a reunion with Anna who had loved him in a previous visitation. Lawrence firmly establishes Nicky's self-centered recalcitrance early on (he refuses to ""end up in the same screw-top jar along with all the rest, battering my wings against the glass till I die of despair"") and follows through in the explosive crossfire of family conversations and his on-again, off-again relationship with a rather willing local girl. His ultimate concession to a more conventional route, by no means prefigured, is properly tentative--kids can accept it without charging compromise. Teenage rebellion with strong background music and a ghostly twist.

Pub Date: April 1, 1977

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Harper & Row

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1977

Categories: FICTION