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The Staircase
by Ann Rinaldi
Published: 2002-06-01
Paperback : 240 pages
Paperback : 240 pages
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How could Lizzy Enders's father abandon her at a girls school run by nuns? She's surrounded by Catholics--but she's Methodist! Shunned by the other boarders, Lizzy befriends a wandering carpenter named José, who with just three tools--and unflagging faith--builds an elaborate spiral ...
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Introduction
How could Lizzy Enders's father abandon her at a girls school run by nuns? She's surrounded by Catholics--but she's Methodist! Shunned by the other boarders, Lizzy befriends a wandering carpenter named José, who with just three tools--and unflagging faith--builds an elaborate spiral staircase in the new chapel in mere weeks. When he disappears without a trace, Lizzy realizes that the way she sees things is not always the way they are.
Inspired by the legend of the "miraculous" staircase in the Chapel of Loretto in Santa Fe, Ann Rinaldi skillfully blends the mystery surrounding the staircase's builder with the daily trials of a spunky thirteen-year-old girl growing up in the 1870s.
Inspired by the legend of the "miraculous" staircase in the Chapel of Loretto in Santa Fe, Ann Rinaldi skillfully blends the mystery surrounding the staircase's builder with the daily trials of a spunky thirteen-year-old girl growing up in the 1870s.
Editorial Review
"'This one is wise,' he said.' This one has an old spirit. She has been among us before.'" Though the Arapaho Indian on the trail praised her old spirit, 14-year-old Lizzy Enders feels anything but wise. Within only a few days, she has lost her mother to the fever, been left by her widowed father at a convent, and thrust into the strange world of the Academy of Our Lady of Light in 1870s Santa Fe. Born a Methodist, Lizzy just can't comprehend Catholicism: "All this talk of blood and martyrdom and eating flesh and agony. It was just all too much, is all." In an attempt to alleviate her misery, Lizzy befriends an unemployed elderly carpenter and suggests he be hired to build the missing staircase for the convent's new chapel. The other girls at the academy are furious, since they have been praying for a miracle to complete the stairs, not an old beggar. Can she convince them that this aged man, with his real tools, is better than an ephemeral miracle? What Lizzy has to discover for herself is that sometimes miracles come disguised in nun's habits... or carpenter's sandals.Based on a legend of a real chapel stairway in Santa Fe, The Staircase is a lively historical fiction that successfully merges myth, religion, and old-fashioned pioneer sensibility. Lizzy's need to make order of her chaotic world and define the unknown are timeless teen traits, making The Staircase a historical novel with real relevance for today's adolescent. (Ages 12 and older) --Jennifer Hubert
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