WHEN PIGS FLY

The eighth-grade family living class assignment is for each student to care for an egg for two weeks, as if it were a real baby. Buddy isn't worried. She's had lots of nurturing experience with her sister Reenie, who has Down's syndrome. Then her parents decide to move to the ramshackle farm outside of town that they inherited from an elderly aunt. It's a dump, and Buddy hates it. Not only does she miss living near her best friend, but she has to ride a bus to school, and her fellow riders are anything but kind to Reenie. A mysterious boy, Dallas, comes to the girls' aid more than once, and Buddy discovers she's not the only one with problems. The point is driven home when she is almost killed in an accident; it is only with the help of Reenie and Dallas that she survives, and in the process accepts some hard truths about herself and the people around her. This engrossing story has enough suspense to keep it hurtling along, but never at the cost of characterization. Everyone is believable, from multi-faceted Buddy, whose love and concern for Reenie is touching and admirable, to Reenie herself, a real personality with some exasperating habits. The secondary characters are just as developed, making every turn of the page and twist of the plot part of a very good read. (Fiction. 10-14)