Description:

A captivating portrait of the free-love, hippie world of Denver in the 1970s, brought to life in the pitch-perfect voice of a girl who scams and scavenges her way through childhood, carving her own identity and creating her own family along the way. In her acclaimed debut novel, Joanna Rose brilliantly evokes a tumultuous era in our history and introduces an unforgettable heroine whose coming-of-age is at once delightfully idiosyncratic and touchingly universal. "This is a wondrous, uncanny book, like few others you will have read....A story so assured and accomplished that its seems the work of a seasoned novelist at the peak of her talent". -- Floyd Skloot, Portland Oregonian "Sarajean's account of her life and experiences are bound to embed themselves thoroughly in a reader's memory.' -- Candace Horgan, The Denver Post "Little Miss Strange is a novel boldly reminding us that peace, love, and happiness weren't the only things to come out of the sixties and seventies...a gloriously descriptive novel, packed with colorful details reminiscent of the dream, the era of free-love left behind". -- Molly MacDermot, Redbook "The ending alone may be as perfect as any novel written this year. Four stars". -- Barbara Holliday, Detroit News/Free Press ** ### Amazon.com Review Set during the high-hippie era of the 1970s, *Little Miss Strange* is a story about a girl growing up to be a woman, but it's about growing up in a period of American life when the adults don't seem to play any of the traditional roles of caretakers or parents. Sarajean is the daughter of hippies--which is to say, of uncertain parentage--and must negotiate the strangeness of life in the rootless world into which she was born. She lives with a guy who may be her father and comes of age in the commune world of drugs, poverty, and the dropout-ethic that marks the times. ### From School Library Journal YA. This coming-of-age story is set in Denver in the late '60s and '70s. Sarajean Henry tells of her life with Jimmy Henry, a Vietnam veteran and former junkie, with whom she was left as a toddler, and of her search for the mother she has never known. Sarajean recounts her everyday experiences, from 1969 through 1977, with a variety of acquaintances who become her surrogate family. Along the way she collects numerous memories and mementos. Cigarettes and marijuana become a part of her normal existence, along with funky clothes and far more freedom than that of an average preteen. Drugs and free love are part of the daily lives of most of the adults around her. Simple sentences, ample dialogue, and short paragraphs combine to reveal a likable, resilient, independent, and gifted girl as she discovers the true meaning of family and her ability to shape her own life.?Dottie Kraft, formerly at Fairfax County Public Schools, VA Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.