I was drawn to the illustration on the front cover of this book while wandering through an antique mall. It reminded me of the work of illustrator Garth Williams but I've read that Jane Langton, a writer of fantasy for children and mysteries for adults, does most of her own illustrating. The cover at any rate is beautiful. I'm intriqued by this Newberry Honor book. It opens with a quote from Thoreau:

I think that no experience I've had today comes up to...the experiences of my boyhood...Nature developed as I developed, and grew up with me...In youth, before I lost any of my senses, I can remember that I was all alive...This earth was the most glorious musical instrument, and I was audience to its strains...The morning and the evening were sweet to me, and I led a life aloof from the society of men.

In Wildness is the preservation of the World.

This may be the perfect coming of age novel. Eight-year-old Georgie's transforming fairy tale relationship with the Goose Prince is contested by the comical villains Ralph Preek and Madeline Prawn. Though her idyll of flying over Walden Pond with the Goose Prince is cut short by her own physical growth and a plot twist I won't reveal here, Georgie is left with new worlds to ponder. Beautifully written and imagined, this book is a treasure!

THE FLEDGLING led me to its ideal release destination. The Little Free Library where I left it is in front of an old, storied house like Georgie's and paces away on the banks of the Ohio River where I saw a Goose Prince. If you have found this book and you would like to, you are invited to share your experience with bookcrossing, a random community of book lovers. We profess book serendipity and have many testimonies from finders of our books to prove that there is such a thing. If you make a journal entry at our site with the BCID (bookcrossing ID) on the bookplate all previous owners of this book will see where it has landed and where it goes after you release it. Bookcrossing is free to join and confidential. You are invited to enjoy this book and if you like to become a part of its story in bookcrossing.