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Book Summary and Reviews of Water Street by Patricia Reilly Giff

Water Street by Patricia Reilly Giff

Water Street

by Patricia Reilly Giff

  • Published:
  • Sep 2006, 192 pages
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About this book

Book Summary

Brooklyn, 1875: Bird Mallon lives on Water Street where you can see the huge towers of the bridge to Manhattan being built. Bird wants nothing more in life than to be brave enough to be a healer, like her mother, Nory, to help her sister Annie find love, and to convince her brother, Hughie, to stop fighting for money with his street gang. Then Thomas Neary and his Pop move in upstairs. Thomas has a secret that only Bird suspects, and who turns out to be the best friend Bird could ever have.

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Reviews

Media Reviews

"Grade 4-8. Though the plot is somewhat predictable and the likable characters are a bit stereotyped, Giff masterfully integrates the historical material and presents a vivid picture of the immigrant struggle in the 1870s." - School Library Journal

"A poignant immigration story of friendship, work, and the meaning of home." - Booklist

This information about Water Street was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

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Author Information

Patricia Reilly Giff Author Biography

Photo © Tim Keating

As a reading teacher for 20 years, the educational consultant for Dell Yearling and Young Yearling books, an adviser and instructor to aspiring writers, and the author of more than 60 books for children, Patricia Reilly Giff spent her entire life surrounded by books.

After earning a B.A. degree from Marymount College, Giff took the advice of the school's dean and decided to become a teacher. During the 20 years of her teaching career, she earned an M.A. from St. John's University, and a Professional Diploma in Reading and a Doctorate of Humane Letters from Hofstra University.

Patricia Reilly Giff and her husband lived in Weston, Connecticut. They have three children and five grandchildren. In 1990, Giff opened The Dinosaur's Paw, a children's ...

... Full Biography

Name Pronunciation
Patricia Reilly Giff: ry-lee (first syllable rhymes with bye). Giff has a hard g

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