House of Dance »

Beth Kephart was nominated for a National Book Award for her memoir A Slant of Sun. Her first novel for teens, Undercover, received four starred reviews and was named a Best Book by Kirkus Reviews, School Library Journal, and Amazon.com. In 2005 Beth was awarded the Speakeasy Poetry Prize.

Rosie and her mother coexist in the same house as near strangers. Since Rosie's father abandoned them years ago, her mother has accomplished her own disappearing act, spending more time with her boss than with Rosie. Now faced with losing her grandfather too, Rosie begins to visit him every day, traveling across town to his house, where she helps him place the things that matter most to him "In Trust." As Rosie learns her grandfather's story, she discovers the role music and motion have played in it. But like colors, memories fade. When Rosie stumbles into the House of Dance, she finds a way at last to restore the source of her grandfather's greatest joy.

Eloquently told, National Book Award finalist Beth Kephart's House of Dance is a powerful celebration of life and the people we love who make it worthwhile.

Publishers Weekly

Distinguished more by its sharp, eloquent prose than by its plot, Kephart's (Undercover) second YA novel probes the fear of loss by introducing a heroine who overcomes it. Abandoned by her father years ago, emotionally distant from her mother, who is caught up in an affair with her married boss, 15-year-old Rosie spends much of the summer before junior year with her terminally ill, widower grandfather, helping him sort through his belongings, all of them stuffed with mementos. As his health rapidly declines, Rosie realizes: "You cannot buy a man who is dying a single meaningful thing. You can only give him back the life he loved and awaken the memories." Determined to retrieve the time her grandfather misses most, when music filled the evenings and he could watch his wife dance, Rosie sets about throwing a dance party at her grandfather's house. Poetically expressed memories and moving dialogue both anchor and amplify the characters' emotions. Ages 12-up. (June)

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