Finding Harmony

Volume XXXI / Issue 16 - December 20 / 2024
Finding Harmony
Finding Harmony
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Finding Harmony

Author: 
Eric Walters
Victoria, BC: Orca Books, Februaary, 2025
246 pp., trade pbk., pdf & epub, $14.95 (pbk.)
ISBN: 
9781459836426 (pbk.) 9781459836433 (pdf) 9781459836440 (epub)
Grades: 
Grades 8 and up
Ages: 
Ages 13 and up
Review by: 
Review by Sarah Wethered (Reviewed from Advance Reading Copy)
4
Excerpt: 

"Your Honor, I’d like to call Ms. Jennings to the stand,” the lawyer said.

“Proceed,” the judge replied.

The judge had a serious expression, almost a scowl, and she looked like somebody you wouldn’t want to mess with.

The social worker, Ms. Jennings – Gloria, as she always told me to call her – got up from her seat beside the lawyer. She was dressed in formal sort of court clothes, but that didn’t hide the fact that she didn’t look that much older than me and was at least as nervous. Come to think of it, I’d probably been in court more times than she had.

The room was so quiet that her shoes made a squeaking sound as she walked to the witness stand and took a seat. The court person asked her to state her name and then “swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth,” and Gloria agreed.

Finding Harmony is a novel that tells the story of Harmony, a grade 7 girl who is fighting to be able to stay with her mother, a single parent who makes bad life decisions. Harmony has been in and out of foster care four times, and she hopes this time her mother will quit the alcohol and drugs and actually be a loving, responsible parent. Things look up when Harmony’s mother arranges for a decent apartment for them to live in, but Harmony soon learns that her mother is back to her bad habits. This is especially apparent as their new apartment is controlled by drug dealers. Harmony must learn to provide the basic necessities of living through working odd jobs at Mr. Khaled’s convenience store across the street and by “liberating” some of the money in her mother’s purse each night. Her school principal also takes Harmony under his wing and tries to help her in her fight to stay with her mother.

Readers of Finding Harmony will want to know if Harmony is able to stay with her mother or whether she is sent back to foster care. Harmony is a well-developed character that shows initiative and great emotional intelligence, despite the unfortunate situation with her mother. Readers will also enjoy reading about Mr. Khaled’s efforts to help Harmony with the basic necessities of life and how this turns to a very warm and caring relationship.

I recommend this novel to fans of realistic fiction or fans of the author, Eric Walters. Finding Harmony is a gripping story that readers will want to read to the very end.

Highly Recommended
Reviewer: 

Sarah Wethered has been a teacher-librarian at New Westminster Secondary School for 25 years, and she currently lives in New Westminster, British Columbia.