Freeing Finch

by Ginny Rorby

Overview

From Ginny Rorby, the author of Hurt Go Happy, winner of ALA’s Schneider Family Book Award, comes Freeing Finch, the inspiring story of a transgender girl and a stray dog who overcome adversity to find love, home, and a place to belong.

When her father leaves and her mother passes away soon afterward, Finch can’t help feeling abandoned. Now she’s stuck living with her stepfather and his new wife. They’re mostly nice, but they don’t believe the one true thing Finch knows about herself: that she’s a girl, even though she was born in a boy’s body.

Thankfully, she has Maddy, a neighbor and animal rescuer who accepts her for who she is. Finch helps Maddy care for a menagerie of lost and lonely creatures, including a scared, stray dog who needs a family and home as much as she does. As she earns the dog’s trust, Finch realizes she must also learn to trust the people in her life—even if they are the last people she expected to love her and help her to be true to herself.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781250293749
Publisher:	Tor Publishing Group
Publication date:	10/06/2020
Pages:	272
Sales rank:	1,124,681
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.62(d)
Lexile:	680L (what's this?)
Age Range:	10 - 14 Years

About the Author

GINNY RORBY is the author of many award-winning books for young readers, including Hurt Go Happy, Dolphin Sky, and How to Speak Dolphin. She holds an undergraduate degree in biology from the University of Miami and an MFA in Creative Writing from Florida International University. She now lives in Fort Bragg, California with several animal companions, including a parrot, cats, and a bat that visits her every winter and roosts in her bathroom. Her goal is to write books that connect children to the natural world.

Editorial Reviews

Note to readers: get tissues ready—there couldn’t have been more tears!”—Terry Hong, Booklist Reader

“No matter their gender identity, young readers will identify with Finch’s struggle to find the relationships she needs to heal her grief and to be who she knows she is in a sometimes scary world. Finch discovers, in her struggle to find the support she needs after her loving mother dies, that forcing the connections we think we need can make us miss the special ones we already have. Finch’s story is The Higher Power of Lucky meets Shiloh.”—Tim Capehart, children’s librarian and head of youth services at Dayton Metro Library, author of Shadowangel and Summer Stranger than Fiction, and two-time Newbery Medal selection committee member

PRAISE FOR HURT GO HAPPY:

“This has the potential to be a classic animal story with wide appeal. It is a heartbreaker…. Rorby successfully gets to the core of a moving animal-human relationship.”—KLIATT, starred review 4Q, 3P, M, J

“This unusual and emotional story will intrigue animal lovers and those looking for a gripping family drama. It is a thought-provoking addition for school and public library collections.” —VOYA

“The writing shines when Rorby focuses on what is her true passion: Sukari and the fate of chimpanzees like her.” —School Library Journal

From the Publisher

2019-07-14
Rorby (How To Speak Dolphin, 2015, etc.) once again tackles social issues through animal relationships.

In her author's note, Rorby explains that the book was originally inspired by an extremely sad dog, but then she met an elderly transgender woman whose experience became the basis for "the heart of this story." She goes on to say she then spoke with some trans children and their families, and Finch Delgado is the unfortunate result. She is an 11-year-old transgender girl who deals with both predictable trans trauma (sexual assault, threats of conversion therapy) as well as the death of her beloved and understanding mother, a ne'er-do-well father, an unemployed, alcoholic stepfather, and his religiously conservative new wife. Finch's solace comes from Maddy, an elderly neighbor who rehabilitates animals, and her new friend Sherri, a cool girl from Vegas with a deadbeat mom. Even if the story didn't whiplash between cookie-cutter angst and the overwrought metaphor of a wary but loyal neglected dog, the story would still be rife with flaws. Finch reads like a much older character, and uneven character development, didactic writing, and excruciatingly slow pacing further derail the reading experience. Finch ultimately comes across as a collection of stereotypes rather than a fully realized character, and the cis characters are all either remorseless bullies or flawless supporters (and sometimes, confusingly, both). Finch's Latinx-sounding surname notwithstanding, characters are default white.

Egregious. (Fiction. 8-12)

Kirkus Reviews