My appreciation goes to Miriam Hood of Austin, Texas, who was the first person PJ’s age to read a draft of the work and whose enthusiasm spurred me to develop the characters. I am equally grateful for the sharp feedback from Cici Todeschini (Rome), Angela Neustatter (London), Gary Smith (Toronto), Deborah Lyons, PhD (Austin), and Teri Rodriguez (Austin).
Finally I thank my dear neighbor Tina Huckabee for her friendship and comments as she read the work chapter by chapter. We all mourned the death of her daughter Shoshana Weintraub (1992–2006), who gave so much of herself to our community. Part of the proceeds of Sunshine Picklelime will be donated to Austin’s Town Lake Animal Center in Shoshana’s memory, to honor the years she volunteered there, along with Tina and Steve and Aaron Weintraub.
about the author
Only a person who has lived as richly as Pamela Ellen Ferguson could create such a lush work of fiction. She was born in Mexico, grew up in Britain and South Africa, and has lived and worked in over a dozen world capitals. A former journalist in London’s Fleet Street, she is now an award-winning international instructor in Zen Shiatsu, and her books for adults, both fiction and non-fiction, have been translated into several languages. She lives in Austin, Texas, surrounded by a garden with cacti as tall as trees. Sunshine Picklelime is her first book for children.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2010 by Pamela Ellen Ferguson
Illustrations copyright © 2010 by Christian Slade
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Random House
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Ferguson, Pamela.
Sunshine Picklelime / by Pamela Ellen Ferguson ; illustrated by Christian Slade. — 1st ed.
p. cm.
Summary: PJ Picklelime can talk to birds, hear bells ringing in a woman’s curls, and spot moonbows in the night sky, but when a close friend dies and her parents separate, she searches for understanding and a way to recover her sunshine.
eISBN: 978-0-375-89303-2
[1. Human-animal communication—Fiction. 2. Birds—Fiction. 3. Wildlife rescue—Fiction. 4. Divorce—Fiction. 5. Death—Fiction.] I. Slade, Christian, ill. II. Title.
PZ7.F3569Su 2010
[Fic]—dc22
2009027877
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