Hold Fast by Blue Balliett
Langston Hughes wrote “Hold
fast to dreams/For if dreams die/Life is a broken-winged bird/That cannot fly.”
As one of the most influential American poets, Hughes weaves words that make
the heart soar and weep simultaneously, two qualities shared with Blue Balliett’s
new YA book Hold Fast. Balliett illuminates the sad but ultimately
hopeful world of Chicago’s homeless shelters through the eyes of one poetry
lover, eleven-year-old Early Pearl.
Early’s father, an aide at
the Chicago Public Library, has disappeared under the most mysterious
circumstances, leaving Early, her younger brother Jubie, and their mother
Summer to fend for themselves. With no money and no clue as to the location of
Dash, the Pearl family must assimilate into the claustrophobic world of the
Chicago shelters. Balliett, author of the award-winning novel Chasing
Vermeer, employs her trademark mystery and problem-solving in Early’s quest
to deduce the location of her father through the poems of Hughes he loved to
share.
