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- Herausgeber: anna ruggieri
- Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019
It's not easy being eleven— especially for Anna Mei Anderson. How is she ever going to fit in with the other sixth graders when she has an unusual name that's associated with a Japanese cartoon, an adoptive family she doesn't remotely resemble, and an unknown birth mother somewhere back in China?
She figures she'd better get busy transforming herself into someone who's less... unusual.
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Anna MeiCartoon Girl
By Carol A. Grund
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication DataGrund, Carol A.
Anna Mei, cartoon girl / by Carol A. Grund.
p. cm.
Summary: When eleven-year-old Anna Mei, who was adopted from China,moves from Boston to small-town Michigan, she finds herself questioningher identity, family history, and more as she seeks a way to fit in.
ISBN 0-8198-0788-5 (pbk.)
[1. Moving, Household--Fiction. 2. Adoption--Fiction. 3. Chinese Amer-icans--Fiction. 4. Schools--Fiction. 5. Identity--Fiction. 6. Individuality--Fiction. 7. Family life--Michigan--Fiction. 8. Michigan--Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.G9328Ann 2010
[Fic]--dc22
2009031628
Many manufacturers and sellers distinguish their products through the use of trademarks. Any trademarked designations that appear in this book are used in good faith but are not authorized by, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.
Cover art by Wayne AlfanoBack cover calligraphy by Eping WeiDesign by Mary Joseph Peterson, FSP
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
“P” and PAULINE are registered trademarks of the Daughters of St. Paul.
Copyright © 2010, Carol A. Grund
Published by Pauline Books & Media, 50 Saint Pauls Avenue,Boston, MA 02130-3491
Printed in the U.S.A.
AMI VSAUSAPEOILL03-1009-09458 0788-5
www.pauline.org
Pauline Books & Media is the publishing house of the Daughters of St. Paul, an international congregation of women religious serving the Church with the communications media.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 13 12 11 10
For Jim, who is my heart;Matthew, Paul, and David,who are my light and inspiration;my parents, who provided merelya lifetime of support;and my editor extraordinaire,Diane, who coaxed Anna Meiout of the desk drawerand gave her a home.
Contents
Chapter OneThe New Kid
Chapter TwoLucky Student Number 24
Chapter ThreeToday’s Special
Chapter FourThe Ponytail Club
Chapter FiveUgly Bedroom Blues
Chapter SixScience Partners
Chapter SevenMore Projects
Chapter EightPrincess Anna Mei
Chapter NineOne of These Things
Chapter TenSaturday Nightmare
Chapter ElevenLunch, Anyone?
Chapter TwelveA Different Danny
Chapter ThirteenJust a Little White Lie
Chapter FourteenFatal Phone Call
Chapter FifteenThe Fall Follies
Chapter SixteenShake, Rattle and Roll
Chapter SeventeenNovember Arrives
Chapter EighteenLucky Charms
Chapter Nineteen“My Daughter, Mei Lei”
Chapter TwentyTeamwork
Chapter Twenty-OneGoodbye, Ponytails
Chapter Twenty-TwoIntroducing Anna Mei
Chapter One
The New Kid
Anna Mei squeezed between the packing boxes scattered around her bedroom, trying to see into the mirror propped against a wall.
She knew her jeans were okay. They were new without being I-got-these-at-the-mall-yesterday new. And she couldn’t go wrong with layered T-shirts, purple over white. It was the shoes she needed to check out—the hot-pink sneakers with silver laces, the ones she had chosen months ago at the department store back home in Boston.
They’d seemed so cute then, so perfect for starting sixth grade. But now that they were on her feet, and her feet were far from home, she worried they might be perfect only if your goal was getting laughed back into fifth grade.
“Anna Mei!” her mother called from downstairs. “You don’t want to be late on your very first day!”
“Guess again,” she answered, too softly for her mother to hear. But Cleo heard, and she came to sympathize by rubbing against Anna Mei’s leg.
“I wish I could stay here with you,” Anna Mei told her, reaching down to stroke the cat’s gray and white fur. “But Mom and Dad have this crazy idea that I should go to school today.”
In fact, her parents had been full of crazy ideas lately. It had really started a year ago, when Anna Mei’s grandmother died. She and Anna Mei’s mother had been very close, so it was no surprise that Mom took it pretty hard. The surprise came on the day her parents announced they were moving to Michigan. Mom decided she wanted to be near the only family she had left, and that meant the small town where her sister—Anna Mei’s Aunt Karen—lived with her husband and two kids.
Of course Anna Mei had tried to talk them out of it, but their minds were made up. Her father had already taken a job doing research for a university, and her mother planned to find a nursing job as soon as they were settled. All through the weeks of packing, they kept insisting that their new life in Michigan would be as good as the old one in Massachusetts. Better, in fact. Even when unexpected delays meant Anna Mei would miss the first two weeks of school, they had assured her that everything would be all right. No worries. Greener pastures awaited. Happy days were—
“Anna Mei!”
Mom’s voice had reached final warning mode.
“Coming!” Anna Mei called. With a last despairing glance at the possibly dopey shoes, she grabbed her backpack and headed downstairs.
Although she would normally take the bus to Elmwood Elementary, her mother had insisted on driving her today. So Anna Mei wasn’t surprised that they were barely out of the driveway when the pep talk started.
“Don’t worry, honey,” Mom said, turning out of their neighborhood and onto a main road. “It will be hard at first, missing your friends back in Boston. I miss mine, too.”
Anna Mei turned her face toward the window. Surely her mother didn’t expect sympathy, not when this had all been her idea in the first place.
“I still think it’s the right thing to do, in the long run,” Mom continued. “In the short run, well . . . I’m just trying to tell you that it will get easier as time goes on. I promise.”
Today, more than any other so far, Anna Mei didn’t trust herself to talk about it. If she fell apart now, she’d never manage to get through the next few minutes, let alone the whole day. Her only hope was to push away all thoughts of her home and school and the friends she’d known since kindergarten.
That strategy lasted approximately three minutes. The moment they pulled into the school parking lot alongside all the cars and buses filled with strangers, Anna Mei felt a wave of panic rise up. She closed her eyes and summoned up a prayer from somewhere deep inside. Dear God, please help me get through this day. I don’t think I can do it alone.
A few kids stopped to stare as she and her mother walked into the school office, but when a bell rang they scurried off like ants late for a picnic.
An older woman looked up from her desk. “May I help you?”
“Hello, I’m Margaret Anderson,” Mom said. “This is my daughter’s first day here.”
“Welcome to Elmwood,” the woman said. “I’m Mrs. Marshall, the school secretary. We’ve been expecting you, Anna Mei. Is that right? May, like the month?”
Anna Mei nodded, wishing for about the billionth time that her parents had named her something normal, like Jessica or Ashley.
“That’s very pretty,” Mrs. Marshall said. Probably Jessica Marshall.
The secretary picked up a file folder and looked inside. “I have some forms to go over with your mother,” she said to Anna Mei, “but since the bell has already rung, I’ll take you to your classroom first.”
She consulted the file again. “You’ve been assigned to Ms. Wagner’s homeroom. You’ll be her twenty-fourth student.” Anna Mei’s face must have shown some of the panic she was trying to hide, because Mrs. Marshall’s voice suddenly softened. “I’m sure you’ll make lots of friends in no time.”
Anna Mei choked back a bitter reply. After all, she’d seen enough new kids over the years to know how it really worked. They were the ones you saw standing around, shuffling their feet, looking at the floor and wondering where they were going to sit. She had just never imagined that one day she’d be one of them.
Leaving her mother at the office, she followed Mrs. Marshall through a maze of hallways, feeling more and more lost. Honestly, if this whole Elmwood thing didn’t work out, she’d never be able to find her way out of here.
Mrs. Marshall finally stopped in front of a door marked 117. She tapped on it softly and pushed it open. “Excuse me, Ms. Wagner,” she said, “your new student is here.”
A voice from inside the room answered, “Thank you. Please send her in.”
Mrs. Marshall gave Anna Mei’s shoulder a quick squeeze. “You’ll be just fine,” she whispered, then turned away and disappeared back down the hall. Anna Mei had to fight the urge to follow her. After all, a school secretary could always use some extra help around the office, couldn’t she?
Instead she took a deep breath and stepped into the room, where twenty-three pairs of eyes were all focused on just one thing—the new kid.
