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    The Great Unexpected
    The Great Unexpected
    The Great Unexpected
    Audiobook5 hours

    The Great Unexpected

    Written by Sharon Creech

    Narrated by Heather O'Neill and Erin Moon

    4/5

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    About this audiobook

    From Newbery Medal winner and bestselling author Sharon Creech comes a grand, sweeping yarn that is a celebration of the great and unexpected gifts of love, friendship, and forgiveness. With a starred review from Kirkus Reviews calling it an ""enchanting tale to treasure,"" The Great Unexpected captures the heart and the imagination.

    Humorous and heartfelt, this is a story of pairs—of young Naomi and Lizzie, both orphans in present-day Blackbird Tree, USA, and of Sybil and Nula, grown-up sisters from faraway Rook's Orchard, Ireland, who have become estranged.

    Young Naomi Deane is brimming with curiosity and her best friend, Lizzie Scatterding, could talk the ears off a cornfield. Naomi has a knack for being around when trouble happens. She knows all the peculiar people in town—like Crazy Cora and Witch Wiggins. But then, one day, a boy drops out of a tree. Just like that. A strangely charming Finn boy. And then the Dingle Dangle man appears, asking all kinds of questions. Curious surprises are revealed—three locked trunks, a pair of rooks, a crooked bridge, and that boy—and soon Naomi and Lizzie find their lives changed forever.

    As two worlds are woven together, Creech reveals that hearts can be mended and that there is indeed a gossamer thread that connects us all.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins
    Release dateSep 4, 2012
    ISBN9780062201904
    Author

    Sharon Creech

    Sharon Creech has written twenty-one books for young people and is published in over twenty languages. Her books have received awards in both the U.S. and abroad, including the Newbery Medal for Walk Two Moons, the Newbery Honor for The Wanderer, and Great Britain’s Carnegie Medal for Ruby Holler. Before beginning her writing career, Sharon Creech taught English for fifteen years in England and Switzerland. She and her husband now live in Maine, “lured there by our grandchildren,” Creech says. www.sharoncreech.com

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    Reviews for The Great Unexpected

    4/5

    22 ratings19 reviews

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    • 3/5
      This book was alright. It wasn't as good as Walk Two Moons in my honest opinion. Many of the characters I was supposed to feel sympathy or sadness for I did not feel due to a lack of character development. Some characters even felt unnecessary to the plot as a whole. Whereas before when Sharon Creech switched between two different stories (Walk Two Moons) each one fed into the other, these two stories being talked about every other chapter did not flow or connect in any significant way. They felt as if they were so unconnected until the very end of the story. While it was an entertaining read, it did not have the emotional impact or depth that Walk Two Moons or other works of hers that I have read. This is why this book is just ok.
    • 4/5
      Great new book from Sharon Creech. Loved the strong girl characters and the magical tone of the plot.
    • 4/5
      The story itself – specifically, the ending – was way too soppy for my taste; but the characters of the two girls Naomi and Lizzie, especially Lizzie the incessant chatterbox, was delightful ... hence 3½***.
    • 3/5
      Naomi and her friend, Lizzie Scatterding, are both foster children living in the quiet town of Blackbird Tree. Life takes on a mysterious air when Finn boy and the Dangle Doodle man show up in a town that's already inhabited by such characters as Witch Wiggins and Crazy Cora. Naomi carries the terrible scars, internal and on her arm, of her father’s death and a dog’s attack. Her guardian parents each share their hearts; Nula remembers privation and her estranged family in Ireland, and Joe teaches Naomi to dream and fly high into the clouds for inner peace. In a parallel story across the sea in Ireland, two women talk of times past, lost families and setting things right. Creech, a Newbery Award–winning author, deftly weaves a multi-layered story in which past and present thread their way around Naomi the romantic and Lizzie the singer. With a Finn boy for each generation, there’s joy in the air and in the reading.
    • 4/5
      The Great Unexpected is a book about family- the family you are born with and the family you make along the way. Two orphans, Naomi and Lizzie have good lives in the little town of Blackbird Tree. Naomi and Lizzie are best friends who try to keep pace with the town's goingons. Life will be forever changed when a young boy named Finn turns up out of the blue and plays with the girl's affections. There is a secondary story happening across the pond in Ireland where two older women are trying to exact revenge and put in place a plan that will change everyone's lives forever. The story and language are endearing and I would put this book in the running for the Newbery award this year. In the end we learn that family is everything and best friendship is always the kind of family that boys will try to break apart if you let them.
    • 4/5
      One day oprhans Naomi and Lizzie meet a boy who fell out of a tree. The boy's name is Finn and he continues to pop into and out of their lives. In a parallel story an old woman appears to be planning something. These two stories eventually come together in an unexpected way. There are some areas of the story that could have been explained further but it was still a good story with these details left to the imagination. Some of the back and forth of the two tales may be a bit confusing and may not appeal to all kids but over all an interesting story with a bit of mystery and intrigue that will leave the reader guessing at the end.
    • 4/5
      A friend let me borrow his (signed!) copy of this delightful book, and I thoroughly enjoyed reading it.

      I wasn't really sure what to to expect from this story, and it kept me engaged all the way through with its twists and turns and the lovely characters. It had a very "fairy tale" feeling, with characters that weren't necessarily completely fleshed out, but they didn't need to be -- they needed to be a little bit larger than life to make this work.

      The two girls at the center of the story were so charming, I especially loved the stories and phrases from Joe, one of the girls' guardian. My especial favorite was "That girl could talk the ears off a cornfield."
    • 4/5
      This was a complex tale about two orphan girls trying to find their place in the world, when a strange boy falls out of a tree! In this small town, things start to get connected, all the way across the ocean in Ireland. This is a nice coming of age story that follows Naomi and Lizzie as they try to find out who they are and where they fit! A great story for upper elementary and middle school students.
    • 4/5
      I liked this version of a Finn McCoul myth! Partly set in the little American town of Blackbird Tree, and partly set in Ireland at the estate of Mrs. Sybil Kavanagh, this is a story of love, betrayal, and the ultimate revenge (no, nobody gets murdered, though Sybil does LOVE a good murder mystery). Lizzie and Naomi are two orphans, best friends who meet the mysterious Finn, who has fallen out of a tree and supposedly is staying with the dim Dimmenses of Black Dog Hill. Naomi is terrified of dogs, as she was badly injured by the dog who killed her father when she was a toddler. Finn keeps reappearing mysteriously in various places through town, first talking to one girl ,then the other... and if Lizzie had any brains at all above her kindhearted motormouth, she'd be just as jealous as Naomi. Sybil is dying, and has set a plan in motion to save the one relationship she misses... the one wrecked by another Finn, long ago, and to exact revenge on those who have wronged her. How the residents of Blackbird Tree figure into her plans is a mystery unwrapped detail by detail throughout the pages of this enchanting story. I love a good Sharon Creech story -- I always find myself completely immersed after the first few chapters, and it takes bulldozers (or a howling third grade daughter) to drag me out again. 6th grade and up -- the structure bouncing back and forth from Ireland to America may be a bit challenging for some readers, but the writing gives you a solid feel for one setting or another, and there's even a font change to help you keep track of things.
    • 2/5
      Naomi and her friend Lizzie live in Blackbird Tree and life is fairly normal for these two foster girls until one day a mysterious boy drops out of a tree and into their lives. After he arrives, strange coincidences happen and Naomi starts to get the feeling that everything is connected and all things happen for a reason. Told from two points of view: Naomi's and Mrs. Kavanagh, the reader must decide how the two are connected, and if it is a positive connection or one that will cause trouble for Naomi. This book was weird...not just Sharon Creech interestingly odd, but weird. I had a difficult time figuring out how all the bits of the story fit together. Eventually it was explained, and although I did like all the connections once it was all laid out, it just took way too long. I also had a hard time with the voice the reader chose for the sidekick in the audio version - it got on my nerves, which could have swayed me more towards the dislike I feel instead of the apathy that may have been :)
    • 4/5
      For some reason, I always have trouble summarizing a Sharon Creech book and The Great Unexpected is no exception. So, maybe I'll just give you a sample from the book.Naomi and Lizzie are 12 year old best friends in Blackbird Tree. On the first day of school their teacher gave an assignment to write about their families. "So the next day, we straggled in with our precious essays about our ragtag families. She made us read aloud. Well, the first five people, that is. Angie lived with a foster family with eight children and four donkeys and seven cats and three snakes. Her real parents were still in jail. Lizzie lived with her foster parents, who were definitely going to be her adoptive parents...Her real mother had had headaches...; her father died 'of the maximum grief'. Carl lived with his uncle, who lost both his legs in a car wreck, and so Carl had to do all the cooking and cleaning and grocery shopping and it wasn't too bad except when his uncle got ahold of the liquor. Delano said he wasn't allowed to write about his family while they were under investigation. And then there was me. I told about my mother givng birth to me and on the second day of my life, she looked at me and said, "Gosh, I feel peculiar," and then she dropped me on her stomach and died of a blood splot that went where it wasn't supposed to go. I started to tell about how my father died of an infection, but the teacher stopped me."What does this have to do with anything? Well, one day, Naomi is walking in the woods and an unfamiliar boy falls out of a tree and knocks her over. This opens the door to Ms. Creech introducing interesting characters in both Blackbird Tree on this side of the ocean as well characters in Ireland "Across the Ocean". And there is a connection, that, through fantasy and innuendo and wonderful writing, Ms. Creech makes credible and fun. And, I'm sure you can guess, by the sample of the book I gave you, it's all about family.Sharon Creech is one of a handful of authors, who writes wonderful books for that hard to write for age, 8-12, along with Joan Bauer (who maybe writes for a slightly older age bracket), Kathi Appelt, Rebecca Stead, to name a few. Give your children and yourself a treat with The Great Unexpected.
    • 3/5
      I love Sharon Creech's ability to create quirky characters but this cast was a little over the top and distracted me from the story itself. Pleasant reading, but far from her best.
    • 5/5
      This is yet another insightful, wonderful book by Sharon Creech.Mentioned as a potential Newbery award winner for 2013, I hope Creech is successful in garnering her third Newbery award.I loved Walk Two Moons, a Newbery medal winner in 1995. She won a Newbery honor in 2001 for The Wanderer.The setting of The Great Unexpected is a teeny, tiny, hamlet of Blackbird Tree. Naomi and Lizzie are good friends, both are orphans. Many in the town of Blackbird face difficult lives. In fact, one new teacher only lasted a year when she realized that most of her pupils sadly are so accustomed to heartbreaking adversity, they consider their lives quite normal.A blend of fantasy, reality and heartwarming genius, here is a sample of Naomi's mental meanderings and the wonderful writing of Creech:"I had big thoughts to match the big wind. I wondered if we find the people we need when we need them. I wondered if we attract our future by some sort of invisible force, or if we are drawn to it by a similar force. I felt I was turning a corner and that change was afoot."Change did happen one day when a young boy named Finn drops from a tree. Trying to decide if he is dead or alive, of this world, or from another, both Naomi and Lizzie are drawn to Finn, who is about to set the town upside down.Quite unexpectedly they learn the power of family, of friendship and love.Highly recommended with fingers crossed that Creech obtains yet another well-deserved Newbery award.4.5 stars
    • 3/5
      This book was fine... but it didn't live up to all the other Creech books I have loved over the years. It just felt so low-key. Things did happen, but the way they were written made this book feel like there was no action at all. You were just switching from America to Ireland over and over and trying to piece together how the stories intertwined. Nothing was that surprising in the end, and I'm still confused about the boy, Finn. This just didn't do anything for me.
    • 5/5
      Really great. Such a strong beginning, love the strong voice right from the moment the dead boy falls from the tree.
    • 2/5
      This book has friendship, boys coming between sisters, mysterious characters, crows (or rooks?), Ireland and America, dogs, traumatic pasts, orphans, small towns... all unfortunately jumbled together into a mess. I enjoyed Naomi and Lizzie well enough (although Lizzie read like Anne of Green Gables on speed and I kind of wanted to muzzle her most of the time... I have no soul). But I could not have cared less about the interspersed chapters with the elderly ladies in Ireland, and the corresponding elderly folks in America. They were supposed to be mysterious, but I just found them confusing and trying, and I suspect many of my kids will, too. Instead of lending a sense of wonder, all the unexplained bits and too-convenient connections between characters just made me feel like the book hadn't been thought through well enough.
    • 5/5
      This is actually a really creepy faerie novel, once you've had some time to process it. I thought it was really interesting and brilliant.
    • 5/5
      loved how everything was weaved together.
    • 4/5
      This is the fourth book that my daughter and I have read this summer. We thoroughly enjoyed every word in this book. The author has a very lyrical, almost poetical style of writing. She has a beautiful way sf phrasing things that makes the reader want to absorb each word.Also,, the pacing is flawless. The story is a mystery that floats back and forth between characters in America and characters in Ireland. The mystery unfolds gradually throughout the story which keeps the reader engaged and entertained (thus the perfect pacing). Each chapter either adds plot elements or reveals important elements.The story really revolves around three sets of sisters. All three sets have argued over a boy (Finn). The result of this competition over a boy is what drives the mystery. There are also several smaller mysteries (the ravens, the strangers in town, the four old people) that interconnect throughout the story. The lines connect and unravel as the various stories are solved. The end of the story is very satisfying. The resolution of the mystery speaks to the interconnectedness of life (the butlers brother is the grumpy older "unfortunate" one armed man in town who once received a letter from Naomi which he treasured for always). All the characters share strange unlooked for connections. This adds a warmth that is not immediately apparent but blossoms between all the characters. The world at the beginning of the story is a cold, rather unfeeling place for the characters. By the end, we discover a community and a home for all of them.Now for the characters - Naomi is the heart and the main line of the story. We follow her through to the conclusion of all the mysteries.The story and the other characters reactions are perceived through her viewpoint. Her emotions and reactions feel very authentic for a young person. A good example of this is her jealousy regarding that Finn Boy. Her emotions are most vivid though at the death of her foster father, Joe. They felt so raw and real. The reader is completely immersed in her shock, pain, and then gradually feeling him still with her.. My daughter had said that Naomi was a person of few words because she had experienced so much pain in her life. She carried a heavy burden that kept her quiet. I felt that this was true. She loved that at the end of the story, Naomi's burden was beginning to lessen and she was able to feel more joy.The other characters came across as more flat. For instance - Lizzy (a character affected by the story deeply) never really grows or changes. By the end, we see her content finally. She has a home, plenty to eat, a future, and a sister in Naomi. Yet, we do t see this contentment or happiness change her at all. She talks too much and annoyed me a bit. My daughter loved this character. She said that Lizzy was unique and quirky - her own person.Nula (foster mom) comes across more as a narrator voice than an actual participant in the story. She tells the stories (in a beautiful way) but strangely seems unmoved by the "unexpected" events. She just seems to go along with whatever happens in the story.In conclusion, this is Naomi's story and was mesmerizing.