The Question of Miracles (Hardcover)

Sixth-grader Iris Abernathy hates life in Corvallis, Oregon, where her family just moved. It’s always raining, and everything is so wet. Besides, nothing has felt right since Iris’s best friend, Sarah, died.
     When Iris meets Boris, an awkward mouth-breather with a know-it-all personality, she’s not looking to make a new friend, but it beats eating lunch alone. Then she learns that Boris’s very existence is a medical mystery, maybe even a miracle, and Iris starts to wonder why some people get miracles and others don’t. And if one miracle is possible, can another one be too? Can she possibly communicate with Sarah again?

ELANA K. ARNOLD completed her M.A. in Creative Writing/Fiction at the University of California, Davis. She grew up in Southern California, where she was lucky enough to have a family who let her read as many books as she wanted. She is the author of several young adult novels as well as the middle-grade novels The Question of Miracles and Far from Fair. She lives in Huntington Beach, California, with her husband, two children, and a menagerie of animals. Visit her website at www.elanakarnold.com.

* "It is her realistic relationship with the matter-of-fact Boris, a most unlikely miracle, that will catch readers, and help pull them toward seeking answers of their own for the story’s very large questions."
—Booklist, starred review

"Just as Iris finally embraces the rain, spinning round and round, readers, too, will recognize the circular patterns of love and loss, joy and grief, life and death. A quiet, affecting journey rendered with keen insight."
—Kirkus

"This is a realistic view of grief, with particular emphasis on the agonizing longing to know if a lost loved one is truly out there somewhere. Iris’s stay-at-home dad fills the story with great flavors and textures--from the baby chicks he hatches to his homemade bread, giving the story a cozy touch despite Iris’s impossible quest for answers."
—School Library Journal

* "Arnold’s heroine confronts her emotions honestly (even when she’s putting on a brave face to mask what she really thinks or feels), and her slow, difficult journey to understand the absence left in Sarah’s wake unfolds with heartbreaking believability."
—Publishers Weekly, starred review

"Iris' grief for Sarah is unusually well captured, touching on the huge importance of the best friend relationship and the amputation felt after such a loss. This is therefore a tender yet smart story that will resonate with readers who work through their emotions by brain as well as heart."
—Bulletin

* "In a third-person narrative that remains fully in Iris's range of understanding, Arnold explores the range of sorrow, anger and grief Iris undergoes...Her gentle explorations of faith, doubt and making a friend while still keeping Sarah close leave a powerful impression."
—Shelf Awareness, starred review