xoxo
LESLYE WALTON was born in the Pacific Northwest. Perhaps because of this, she has developed a strange kinship with the daffodil — she too can achieve beauty only after a long, cold sulk in the rain. Her debut novel, The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender, was inspired by a particularly long sulk in a particularly cold rainstorm spent pondering the logic, or rather, lack thereof, in love — the ways we coax ourselves to love, to continue loving, to leave love behind.
Leslye Walton has an MA in writing. When she’s not writing, she teaches middle-school students how to read and write and, most important, how to be kind to one another, even on days when they don’t really feel like it. She is currently working on her next novel. Leslye Walton lives in Seattle.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or, if real, are used fictitiously.
Copyright © 2014 by Leslye Walton
Family tree illustration by Pier Gustafson, copyright © 2014 by Candlewick Press
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in an information retrieval system in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, taping, and recording, without prior written permission from the publisher.
First electronic edition 2014
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 2013946615
ISBN 978-0-7636-6566-1 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-0-7636-7034-4 (electronic)
Candlewick Press
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Somerville, Massachusetts 02144
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