A SECOND SPRINGTIME

by Gordon Cooper ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 1975

Eleven-year-old Hester, among a group of six English orphans transported to Nova Scotia to find homes among families living there, is fortunate in coming to the Clarke family, consisting of a mother, father, brother her age and baby brother, and she is forever being grateful for her good fortune, never asking for (or feeling deserving of) more than she gets. The details of daily life in the old days are presented for all young girls who still enjoy reading about such domestic activities as milking, sewing neat stitches, cooking and cleaning, but after a while the steady stream of ""Yes, Ma"" (or, alternatively, ""Yes, please"") is wearing. Hester's major crises are a false accusation of theft (later proved to be all a mistake), the difficulty in winning over Ben, the brother her age, and then in the end the death of one of the other orphans who has made her way many miles back to where she knew Hester had been left off the previous year. This final event, resuiting from the mistreatment Bethanne received from her ""benefactors,"" seems incongruous; perhaps it is mean to point up the vagaries of fate and the overwhelming greatess of Hester's own good fortune. Surely even in the days of the Puritan ethic people were not so vapid as these.

Pub Date: April 1, 1975

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Nelson

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1975

Categories: FICTION