Where the Lockwood Grows

by Olivia A Cole

Overview

A New York Public Library Best Book of 2023!

“A mystery...brimming with heart.” —Kwame Mbalia, #1 New York Times bestselling author of the TRISTAN STRONG series

A lyrical and environmentally-focused story about sisterhood, adventure, and activism—perfect for fans of The Last Cuentista and The City of Ember.

Twelve-year-old Erie has never lived life fully in the sunlight. After destructive wildfires wreaked havoc on the world around her, the government came up with a plan—engineer a plant that cannot burn. Thus, the fire-resistant lockwood was born. The lockwood protects Erie and her hometown of Prine, but it grows incredibly fast and must be cut back every morning. Only the town’s youngest and smallest citizens can fit between the branches and tame the plant. Citizens just like Erie.

But one evening, Erie uncovers a shocking secret that leads her to question the rules of Prine. Alongside her older sister, Hurona, she’ll journey from the only home she’s known and realize that the world is much more complicated than she'd ever imagined. Packed with surprising twists and a cast of courageous characters, this gripping novel encourages readers to stand up for justice and challenge the status quo.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780316449328
Publisher:	Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Publication date:	08/15/2023
Sold by:	Hachette Digital, Inc.
Format:	eBook
File size:	5 MB
Age Range:	8 - 12 Years

About the Author

Olivia A. Cole is a writer from Louisville, Kentucky. Her essays, which often focus on race and womanhood, have been published in Bitch Media, Real Simple, The LA Times, HuffPost, Teen Vogue, Gay Mag, and more. She teaches creative writing at the Kentucky Governor’s School for the Arts, where she guides her students through poetry and fiction, but also considerations of the world and who they are within it. She is the author of several books for children and adults. Learn more about Olivia and her work at oliviaacole.com and follow her on Twitter @RantingOwl.

Editorial Reviews

07/03/2023

Devastating blazes once threatened to destroy the city of Prine, until scientist Dr. Lunata Elemneiri engineered a powerful, fireproof plant called lockwood. Now, dense lockwood shrouds Prine in darkness. To make ends meet, children small enough to maneuver its branches—like 12-year old Erie—are forced to prune the plant to filter sunlight as well as sell lockwood clippings to FOLROY, a company that owns most of the products in Prine. At home, Erie grows distant from her older sister Hurona, who has outgrown working in the lockwood, and worries about her emotionally exhausted inventor mother, who’s grieving the deaths of Erie’s aunt and father. After a fight between Erie and Hurona leads to shocking revelations about their town, the sisters leave together for Petrichor, a nearby city where they hope to confront Dr. Elemneiri regarding the rumored conspiracy. As they embark on their trek, Erie and Hurona must relearn how to open up to each other, especially as their investigation dredges up old family secrets. Erie’s hopeful stream-of-consciousness narrative and the protagonists’ tumultuous sisterhood add an emotionally grounded through line to this jam-packed, climate-oriented allegory by Cole (Dear Medusa), which acutely highlights the impact of capitalism and its tendency to prioritize profits over people. Ages 8–12. Agent: Patrice Caldwell, New Leaf Literary. (Aug.)

Publishers Weekly

This book is a wonderful breath of fresh air, a mystery of nature and our environment that is brimming with heart. Read, learn and fall in love with Erie's adventure to save her home and her family.—Kwame Mbalia, #1 New York Times bestselling author of the TRISTAN STRONG series

Olivia Cole is quite simply one of the finest and most unafraid storytellers....She listens, and then she translates, in bold and beautiful words, all the things that matter to her, and most definitely should to us.—Kwame Alexander, #1 New York Times bestselling author of THE DOOR OF NO RETURN

Readers who enjoy books about science and the environment will love this.—Booklist

Lyrical, imaginative, and timely– WHERE THE LOCKWOOD GROWS not only makes readers think about their place in the natural world and their own personal responsibility, but is also a gripping and entertaining adventure.—Jasmine Warga, New York Times bestselling author of OTHER WORDS FOR HOME

Beautifully written and full of insight and adventure, Where the Lockwood Grows is a timely, ambitious story about justice and finding one’s place in the world.—Ashley Herring Blake, award-winning author of IVY ABERDEEN’S LETTER TO THE WORLD

From the Publisher

2023-05-24
A company-town dystopia laced with a climate change message.

Set in an unspecified future time, this novel follows 12-year-old Erie, who was named after one of the two Great Lakes that hasn’t dried up yet; her 16-year-old sister, Hurona, was named after the other. Erie works in the branches of the lockwood trees that surround her town of Prine. The fireproof, human-invented lockwood, planted after the devastating Arborklept fire, grows so quickly that each morning, Prine’s younger kids cut away top branches to let the sun in and harvest the pods the tree produces. Each week, FOLROY company trucks from the wealthy city of Petrichor pick up the pods and pulp, paying the townspeople a pittance. The grim lives of Prine’s residents are well described, but readers will wonder why Erie dreads growing too big to work in the tree; it’s not explained why that’s preferable to being safer on the ground, where Hurona works. After Hurona and Erie discover something sinister about the lockwood, they smuggle themselves to Petrichor to find the scientist who developed it. At least that’s Erie’s intent; the one surprising plot twist is what Hurona’s actual mission is. Erie’s thoughts often interrupt the narrative flow with strained metaphoric connections and ultimately come across as telling readers rather than letting them figure things out for themselves. Erie and Hurona are White, and Hurona is queer; the supporting cast is diverse in race and sexuality.

Earnest but heavy-handed. (Dystopian. 12-14)

Kirkus Reviews