The Pearl Thief by Elizabeth Wein
YA Fiction
This sensitive coming of age story, set in 1938 Scotland, is richly detailed and suspenseful. Julie, 15, returns from boarding school to spend a final summer on her late grandfather’s rural estate before it is converted to a boy’s school. Before anyone realizes she is home, she is attacked and left unconscious, wakening in the hospital with no memory of what happened. She quickly befriends her rescuers, Ellen and Euan, a brother and sister whose family are Travellers, reviled in the community, but with a long connection to Julie’s family. When Julie learns that the historian who was cataloging the estate’s antiquities has disappeared, and that some artifacts might be missing, memories of the attack begin to trickle back. As suspicions in the community turn toward Julie’s new friends, Julie, her brother Jamie, and Ellen and Euan begin to uncover clues that indicate there is more to the disappearance than anyone believed. As the investigation continues, Julie begins to question many of her own assumptions about her place in the world. This is a prequel to Wein’s Code Name Verity, but reads well as a stand-alone.
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