Wenny Has Wings

Wenny Has Wings

In the fight with the truck barreling toward them, Wenny and Will lost big. Wenny lost her life. Will lost a sister -- and lost faith in himself. But then Will starts writing letters to Wenny. He tells her all about the secret of his near-death experience, and the troubles he's having at home. Some letters are funny. Some letters are harsh. And when read together, they tell the story of a boy who finds a way to move past death and learns how to live again.... Kirkus Reviews A heartrending glimpse into what happens in a family when a child dies. Philadelphia Inquirer Affecting. Publishers Weekly Poignant. Children's Bookwatch Highly recommended. JANET LEE CAREY grew up in Marin County California surrounded by whispering redwoods. Sunlight cut through ocean mist and fingered through the branches. It was in this magical place that she first dreamed of writing books. Her award-winning teen fantasy novels are translated into many languages. Some include: The Dragons of Noor, which won a Teens Read Too Gold Star Award for Excellence, Stealing Death , which received a School Library Journal starred review, Dragon’s Keep , an ALA Best Books for Young Adults, and Wenny Has Wings , a Mark Twain Award recipient and a Sony Feature Film Japan, 2008. Janet lives with her family, dusty book stacks, and imperious cat near Phantom Lake in Washington. Visit Janet online at www.janetleecarey.com. Wenny Has Wings By Janet Lee Carey Aladdin Paperbacks Copyright © 2004 Janet Lee Carey All right reserved. ISBN: 068986759X Chapter 1 Dear Wenny, I died too. Not when the truck first hit us, but right after in the hospital. I had a broken leg and a ruptured spleen, and I was bleeding inside and outside. I was pretty messed up by the truck, and while they were trying to fix me, my heart stopped for a whole ten minutes. I sped through a tunnel when I died, then I flew around in the sky. I'd be flying up there with you still if Dr. Westfall hadn't put two paddles on my chest and shot electric energy into my heart. Those paddles must have had a lot of power, because they sucked me back inside my body. Once my heart started pumping again, the doctors gave me an operation and filled me up with new blood so I would stay alive. When I woke up, I found out you didn't come back like I did. I asked Mom if Dr. Westfall used those electric paddles on your heart, but she wouldn't give me an answer. She just started crying and had to leave the room. So you're flying around up there in that good place, and I'm stuck down here at Children's Hospital with stitches in my side and with my leg all bandaged up because they had to put my shinbone back together. DAY 10 Dear Wenny, Today is October 16. It's been ten days since I died and came back. That's why I wrote "Day 10" on the top of this letter. I want to keep track of how many days I've been alive again. One bad thing happened while I was outside my body, but I don't want to talk about that, I want to talk about the happy part. I still have some good leftover feelings from the time I spent inside the light. It's like that good, bright light leaked into me while I was up there, and I brought some of it back. I'd be completely happy if you had come back too. We could talk about what it was like to zoom through the air and do double jumps in the sky. I'm already starting to miss you. A big brother gets used to having a little sister around. If you were here, you'd press my control buttons so my hospital bed would go up and down. You'd want to take both cookies off my lunch tray. You'd steal my bedpan so I'd have to ask for help if I needed to pee. I missed your memorial service on Sunday because I had to stay here in the hospital. Sometimes I start to think about you being dead and never coming back to live with us, and I have to put the pillow over my face so nobody will hear my crying. DAY 11 Dear Wenny, All day long nurses keep coming into my room, saying, "Hi, Will. How's the leg?" "Okay," I say, which is a total lie. Then they take my temperature and blood pressure and shoot medicine into my IV. In case you want to know, an IV's an upside-down water bottle on a pole. Medicine runs down a long tube and into a needle that's stuck in my left hand. The medicine goes into my blood and spreads around my whole body. If you think I'm having trouble playing video games with a needle jammed in the back of my hand, you're wrong. Today I played Zorgon Tracker. I killed about a gazillion zorgons and made it to the eighth level, which is, like, impossible unless you're a total wiz-nerd. DAY 11 (AGAIN) I tried to tell Mom and Dad what happened when I died, but it didn't work out so good. As soon as I started talking about the truck hitting us and how I died, Mom sat down and covered her face. She had to use a bunch of tissues from my tissue box to wipe her eyes and blow her nose. Dad didn't cry like Mom, but he didn't look at me