Ten years ago this summer, I took my first-ever writing class from Kathi Appelt at Rice University.  It was early on in my husband’s year-long surgery fellowship, and we’d just arrived in Houston.  The heat was unbearable, the people were outrageously polite (“Hello, ma’am”s everywhere!), and Kathi was fascinatingly interesting, as were all the attendees–some of whom have already gone on to make names for themselves.

Kathi is known for her picture books.  The Underneath is her debut middle grade novel, although to be honest, it’s just as endearing to any adult reading.  The Underneath is about so much more than a hound dog who’s found family in a calico cat and her boy-and-girl set of kittens.  It’s about the sweeping emotions that affect us all.  It’s about anger and revenge and redemption and hope and promises-to-be-kept.

The writing is gorgeous, taut and precise.

I don’t know how it would affect a child.  Kathi doesn’t shirk from the hard truth of life.  I only know that it touched my heart, and I want to say, “Here’s an author you can bank on,” not in terms of money (although this book will do well!), but in terms of truth-telling and bearing witness to “things that happen.”

Read it.  It was a National Book Award Finalist and a Newbery Honor Award winner.  You’ll need books to recommend to your children.

[Post image: Partial view of Simon & Schuster’s wallpaper for The Underneath]