Reviewed by Marta Morrison for TeensReadToo.com

I can't stop thinking about this story. It is deep and completely satisfying.

Andrea Anderson is a loner in high school. She plays on the sidelines of life. She has a single mom who is very demanding and her life is very dull and ordinary. She thinks of school as a theater, and as she travels the hallways she sees different soap opera scenes.

The one thing that Andrea loves are dogs and long walks in the countryside. Andrea's mom works at the local hospital and when one of the neighbors is admitted, she volunteers Andrea to walk the neighbor's dog. This single event changes Andrea's life.

When she meets Honora, her neighbor, and Honora's dog, Zena, Andrea finds acceptance for the first time. Honora employs Andrea to be her assistant. Honora is an artist and loves nature. She teaches Andrea about pottery, herbs, plants, dyes, and how to look at life beneath the surface. Andrea starts to be open about life and seeing people in a completely new light.

This story was full of metaphors about art, life, and nature. It was also a coming of age story about a lonely young girl who finds her way in this world. I highly recommend this quiet little story about life. I promise it will stay with you for a long time afterward. ( )

It was really good, although sad, it’s one of the books that sticks with you. The plot was really good and watching the main character Andrea go from shy and friendless to a whole different person by meeting a dog and Honora. It was a lot better than I thought, I started it then forgot about it until I was bored and once I got back into it I couldn’t put it down. This book was amazing. Beautifully written the characters were great. I felt like I knew them, especially Honora, I wish she was my best friend. AHS/HK

It was really interesting and at first u wasn’t real into it but it got a lot better as you read. The most compelling aspect is when Andrea meets Honora and finds out she’s sick and their relationship grows. It was good, had a lot of meaning to it. It was kind of deep when they discuss death and other things but most kids could understand it. AHS/RK

A character is wish with philosophical advise that is easy, and great to take to heart. Especially if the reader has experienced the loss of a loved one or suffers with low self-esteem. The character from my previous answer…a cancer struck woman with so much knowledge of art, culture, and geography. I envied her love of life. No ends were left loose and there wasn’t a cliché to be found within the pages. The title opposite pigment cover colors are misleading a bit, I thought the plot would revolve around racism. AHS/SS

What a wonderful and unexpected book! I really enjoyed the twisting of what could have been an ordinary teen novel, into something far better. I also liked the developing friendship between Andrea and Ashley, but would have liked a little more character development about why Andrea's mother was so unsupportive, as it felt that there wasn't quite enough there. Even with that, I still love it. ( )

Everyone in her high school seems to have a role to play - cheerleaders, geeks, jocks... Everyone except Andrea Anderson. She's so uninteresting that she's invisible to her classmates and teachers. But when she gets a job as an assistant to a local hermit artist, Honora will help Andrea see that she's beautiful and vibrant on the inside.

This one started a little slowly for me, but about 60 or 70 pages I really got into it. It's a beautiful story of Andrea's quest to find herself and her place. She learns that people aren't always what they appear to be (including herself) and that she doesn't need to be what others see in her. She needs to be who she wants to be. This is a quiet, absorbing story and one I won't soon forget. ( )

I wasn't sure what to expect when I started this book. The cover is beautiful, but gives nothing away. The back cover reads only "Do you know what's underneath if you scratch the surface?" Which also gives nothing away, though it does hint at the depth of the novel. Even once you read the inside flap, you don't really know if this is some sort of fantasy story or just straight fiction. In a way it is fantasy, but not in such a way that the book should be shelved anyplace other than regular fiction. It's a story that any girl (or boy) who wasn't ever that popular in high school can related to. In loose terms, it's about love, loss and growing up. But Crane's book is so much more than that. It's an extraordinary view into a world that is like our own, but not quite. Our heroine, Andrea, is in the process of discovering who she is and in doing so, she uncovers more than she bargains for. She might not find herself by the end of the novel, but what she does find is much, much better. ( )