Moon over Manifest by Clare Vanderpool

Manifest verb: to show something clearly, through signs or actions

Manifest adjective: easily noticed or obvious

It's taken me a few days to read this 2011 winner of the Newbery Medal and I am glad I didn't rush because this book does require some concentration as we shift between 1917-1918 and 1936 and also juggle a myriad of small town sightly eccentric characters. I finished this book around 2am last night and on page 320 I gasped out loud because Clare Vanderpool made me care so much about the people of this town and, well I can't tell you what happened on October 28th, 1918 only to say this is a very sad moment and a powerful turning point in the story. Another marker of a great story to me is when I finish my journey, in this case to Manifest, I then am so keen to think of another reader who will enjoy this book - that's one of the many things I do miss about working in a school library. 

Here are a few of the characters:

• Abilene Tucker, a brave 12-year-old girl.
• Shady Howard, pastor, bootlegger and owner of the home where Abilene lives in Manifest
• Gideon Tucker, father of Abilene.  He sends her to Manifest. [absent parent]
• Miss Sadie Redizon, a mysterious Hungarian fortune teller who only tells stories about the past.
• Jinx, a boy that comes to Manifest.
• Soletta (Lettie) Taylor, Abilene's friend who is helping find the Rattler and Ruthanne's cousin
• Benedek (Ned) Gillian, friend of Jinx

Minor characters

• Hattie Mae Harper, the town's newspaper reporter who helps Abilene research her family's past.
• Sister Redempta, the town's school teacher nun, also helps with other affairs.
• Mr. Underhill, an undertaker
• Velma T Harkrader, chemistry teacher
• Eudora Larkin, president of the Daughters of the American Revolution in Manifest

Publisher blurb: The movement of the train rocked me like a lullaby. I closed my eyes to the dusty countryside and imagined the sign I’d seen only in Gideon’s stories: Manifest—A Town with a rich past and a bright future. Abilene Tucker feels abandoned. Her father has put her on a train, sending her off to live with an old friend for the summer while he works a railroad job. Armed only with a few possessions and her list of universals, Abilene jumps off the train in Manifest, Kansas, aiming to learn about the boy her father once was. Having heard stories about Manifest, Abilene is disappointed to find that it’s just a dried-up, worn-out old town. But her disappointment quickly turns to excitement when she discovers a hidden cigar box full of mementos, including some old letters that mention a spy known as the Rattler. These mysterious letters send Abilene and her new friends, Lettie and Ruthanne, on an honest-to-goodness spy hunt, even though they are warned to “Leave Well Enough Alone.” Abilene throws all caution aside when she heads down the mysterious Path to Perdition to pay a debt to the reclusive Miss Sadie, a diviner who only tells stories from the past. It seems that Manifest’s history is full of colourful and shadowy characters—and long-held secrets. The more Abilene hears, the more determined she is to learn just what role her father played in that history. And as Manifest’s secrets are laid bare one by one, Abilene begins to weave her own story into the fabric of the town.

The mementos in the box are a fishing lure; a tiny doll from a nesting set; a silver dollar; a skeleton key and a cork. "To me they were like treasures from a museum, things a person could study to learn about another time and the people who lived back then." And that's exactly what happens. Abilene loses her father's lucky compass in the local graveyard. It turns up in the home of Miss Sadie hanging from the roof of her verandah. Abilene breaks a huge pot in the garden when she climbs up to retrieve her precious compass and so as payment she has to do chores and gardening for Miss Sadie. Over the coming weeks Miss Sadie tells Abilene stories of the town specifically events of 1917-1918 and each story mysteriously mentions one of the objects from that cigar box she found under the floorboards at Shady's place. I do enjoy stories that feel like making a jigsaw. It is not until you reach the end of the story that the whole picture is revealed - this is very satisfying. 

Listen to an audio sample from chapter one. Ms Yingling did not really like Moon over Manifest but she does give a good story summary as usual. 

I just can’t even begin to tell how enamoured I am of this book. It is one of those deceptively simple slow-burning stories: the kind that needs to be savoured little by little so that the reader can truly absorb its subtle themes and its hidden meanings. It features stories within stories and the power that those stories hold in preserving memory as well as changing the future of a place. The Book Smugglers

Kirkus star review.

Clare Vanderpool is an American children's book author living in Wichita, Kansas. Her first book, Moon Over Manifest, won the 2011 Newbery Medal, becoming the first debut author to achieve the feat in thirty years. I am now very keen to read her second book published in 2014

Here is a list of Newbery winners from 2001 onwards:

• A Year Down Yonder (2001)
• A Single Shard (2002)
• Crispin (2003)
• The Tale of Despereaux (2004)
• Kira-Kira (2005)
• Criss Cross (2006)
• The Higher Power of Lucky (2007)
• Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! (2008)
• The Graveyard Book (2009)
• When You Reach Me (2010)
• Moon Over Manifest (2011)
• Dead End in Norvelt (2012)
• The One and Only Ivan (2013)
• Flora & Ulysses (2014)
• The Crossover (2015)
• Last Stop on Market Street (2016)
• The Girl Who Drank the Moon (2017)
• Hello, Universe (2018)
• Merci Suárez Changes Gears (2019)
• New Kid (2020)
• When You Trap a Tiger (2021)
• The Last Cuentista (2022)
• Freewater (2023)

These might seem like strange choices but here are some companion reads:

Pony

The Parker Inheritance

One came home

Someplace to call Home

Walking with Miss Millie

Three times Lucky