blended family YA series.

After reading Winter’s Tide by Lisa Williams Kline, I was excited to share it with my students who are the same age as main characters Diana and Stephanie. I love having “book talks” with my kids, and really appreciate Zonderkids sending along this wonderful addition to my classroom library. This is Book 4 of the Sisters in all Seasons series, previous installments revolved around the other three seasons, very clever. It was a bit juvenile for my ninth graders, regardless of the character’s ages, but we all thought it was a good read regardless. Involving real issues like blended families and death.

A little background, Diana’s mom and Stephanie’s dad got married, blending the two families together. Winter’s Tide focuses on the importance of forgiveness. Diana and Stephanie are not only stepsisters, but opposites, and have always had a rocky relationship. Things get even rockier when everything goes wrong all at once. When Stephanie’s grandmother is hospitalized and Diana is suspended for fighting a bully, the holes in their patchy relationship threaten to grow wider. Oddly enough, it is the beaching of a pilot whale on the North Carolina coast that brings the two girls together and gives them a fresh awareness of their own weaknesses and empathy with each other.