WISH

A compassionate, wholly absorbing story about 15-year-old Bee, her beloved 11-year-old brother, Tommy, who has cystic fibrosis, and their sometimes-flighty single mother, who travel from small-town New Hampshire to San Francisco via a wish-granting organization for kids with life-threatening medical conditions. Tommy, with a quiet, intelligent intensity, is a shark expert whose dream is to dive with great white sharks "because they are the apex predator fish and they fascinate me." Bee, responsible and high-achieving, is protective of Tommy and hopes that this trip to the Farallones will give him one exciting day "filled all the way up." But it's an unplanned expedition to Half Moon Bay and Maverick's Break, a surfing location known for its 50-foot waves, that affects both of them deeply. Writing from Bee's point of view using clear, distinctive prose that is interspersed with Tommy's intriguing facts about sharks, shark attacks, whales and the ocean, Monninger adroitly creates a moving, suspenseful story of survival that is part surfing adventure, part nature-and-science tale. A winning generosity of spirit infuses the narrative, particularly regarding shark/animal conservation. (afterword) (Fiction. 12 & up)