Open Collections

Crowgirl’s amazing adventure scrapbook

University of British Columbia

This is a story about the different kinds of thinking and spiritual celebration that children use to deal with death and grief. Two young girls, Lunamoon and Crowgirl become close friends at a children's residential cancer treatment centre. The girls and four other children form a small gang and name themselves 'The Googlegobbets.' Using storytelling, art, literature, music, drama, and celebrations 'The Googlebgobbets' support each other as they deal with pain, fear, anger, and grief. The novel begins when thirteen year old, Karen, tells her best friend, Nora that she's off to 'Chemo Camp' for her summer vacation. At the camp Karen immediately becomes close friends with nine year old roommate, Crowgirl. Inspired by Crowgirl's nickname she chooses a nickname, Lunamoon. Lunamoon has a curable form of cancer that she rightly believes she can beat. Crowgirl is terminally ill and relatively at peace with her impending death. However, Lunamoon is shocked to learn that Crowgirl's mother rarely visits. Raised by an agnostic parent, Lunamoon tries to create a kind of eternity, a forever in her imagination with cues in the real world that will refresh her memories of Crowgirl on a daily basis. Lunamoon moves from magical thinking to imaginative story telling as a means of dealing with the imminent death of her friend. She can't understand Crowgirl's mother as there is no clear reason for her behaviour. As well Lunamoon must face the unfairness of all their illnesses. She hears Crowgirl say, "...life is good." but she feels that life is unfair. Will Lunamoon ever understand Crowgirl's feeling? Perhaps she won't, at least not entirely.

Text

2010-01-16

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http://hdl.handle.net/2429/18329

Children's Literature

University of British Columbia

UBCV

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