If I Could Fly: With Characters from "an Island Like You"

If I Could Fly is a standalone novel based on characters introduced in Judith Ortiz Cofer's bestselling short story collection, An Island Like You: Stories of the Barrio, which won the inaugural Pura Belpr Award.

Fifteen-year-old Doris is used to taking care of herself. Her musician parents have always spent more time singing in nightclubs than watching after her. But when her ailing mother goes home to Puerto Rico to get well and pursue a singing career there, and her father finds a new girlfriend, Doris is more alone than she's ever been.

Disconnected from her family and her best friends, who are intertwined in terrifying relationships with a violent classmate, Doris finds refuge in taking care of homing pigeons on her apartment building's roof. As Doris tries to make sense of it all, she learns that, just like the pigeons, she might have to fly far distances before she finds out where she belongs.

Binding Type: Hardcover
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (Byr)
Published: 05/24/2011
ISBN: 9780374335175
Pages: 195
Weight: 0.70lbs
Size: 8.66h x 6.26w x 0.79d

Review Citations: Kirkus Reviews 04/01/2011
Horn Book Magazine 05/01/2011 pg. 84
Bulletin of Ctr for Child Bks 06/01/2011
Booklist 05/15/2011 pg. 46
Voice of Youth Advocates 06/01/2011 - Recommended - Better Than Most
School Library Journal 06/01/2011 pg. 112
Kirkus Best Young-Adult Books 12/01/2011 pg. 2223

Accelerated Reader Quiz #/Name: 144264 / If I Could Fly
Reading Level: 5.3 / Interest Level: Middle Grade Plus / Point Value: 7