Verwandte Artikel zu Outrun the Moon

Outrun the Moon - Softcover

Lee, Stacey

 
9780147516916: Outrun the Moon
Softcover
ISBN 10: 0147516919 ISBN 13: 9780147516916
Verlag: Speak, 2017

Inhaltsangabe

From the New York Times bestselling author of The Downstairs Girl comes an unforgettable story of determination set against a backdrop of devastating tragedy, perfect for fans of Code Name Verity.

Winner of the PEN Center USA Literary Award for Young Adult
Winner of the Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature
 
Fifteen-year-old Mercy Wong is determined to break from the poverty of Chinatown, San Francisco in 1906, and an education at St. Clare’s School for Girls is her best hope. Although St. Clare’s is off-limits to all but the wealthiest white girls, Mercy gains admittance through a mix of cunning and a little bribery, only to discover that getting in was the easiest part. Not to be undone by a bunch of spoiled heiresses, Mercy stands strong—until disaster strikes.

On April 18, a historic earthquake rocks San Francisco, destroying Mercy’s home and school. Now she’s forced to wait with her classmates for their families in a temporary park encampment. Though fires might rage, and the city may be in shambles, Mercy can’t sit by while they wait for the army to bring help—she still has the “bossy” cheeks that mark her as someone who gets things done. But what can one teenage girl do to heal so many suffering in her broken city?

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Stacey Lee is the New York Times bestselling author of the novels The Downstairs Girl, Luck of the Titanic, Under a Painted Sky and Outrun the Moon, the winner of the PEN Center USA Literary Award for Young Adult Fiction. She is a fourth-generation Chinese American and a founding member of We Need Diverse Books. Born in Southern California, she graduated from UCLA and then got her law degree at UC Davis King Hall. She lives with her family outside San Francisco. You can visit Stacey at staceyhlee.com. Or follow her on Twitter @staceyleeauthor.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

In my fifteen years, I have stuck my arm in a vat of slithering eels, climbed all the major hills of San Francisco, and tiptoed over the graves of a hundred souls. Today, I will walk on air.

Tom’s hot-air balloon, the Floating Island, hovers above us, a cloud of tofu-colored silk trapped in netting. After scores of solo flights, Tom finally deemed it safe enough to bring me aboard. I run my hands over the inner wall of the bamboo basket, which strains at the stakes pinning it to the ground. Both the balloon and I are itching to take off.

Outside the basket, Tom holds out his tongue to test the wind. The bald spot on his head is growing back, to my relief. He hadn’t wanted the haircut, but I had insisted after he agreed to swipe me a costly chuen pooi bulb from his father’s next shipment.

“Wind’s blowier than I thought,” he mutters, looking askance at the deserted hills of the Presidio Military Reservation. We use English with each other out of habit. At school, they prohibit us from speaking our native Cantonese.

“It’s hardly more than a baby’s breath! You’re not having second thoughts, are you?”

“No.” His smooth “good fortune” forehead wrinkles. Tom has the kind of golden face that stays handsome even when he’s worried or annoyed. “I’m already onto third and fourth.”

I wince at the mention of “four.” Tom glances at me standing motionless. I’ve never told him that I don’t like fours, after a lifelong string of mishaps involving that digit. He knows I normally scoff at my ma’s fortune-telling superstitions. He would just tease me.

But today, I refuse to be outdone by a number. I force a grin. “I didn’t spend two hours pumping the balloon with air to keep my feet on the ground.”

The predawn April chill makes me shiver through my quilted jacket. I can’t deny the light breeze. But we’re only making a quick trip up and down—ten minutes of weightless suspension, tops.

A portable stove with a funnel top directs heat through a hose into the throat of the balloon. It puffs up like a proud mother owl. I fill my own lungs, and my excitement surges once again. Flying!

Crouching, Tom scoops more coal into the stove with his spench, the half-spade half-wrench tool he made himself. He uses the wrench side to lock the stove door. “Stop bouncing. You’ll break my basket.”

“Stop worrying. They use bamboo for tiger cages. I can’t be worse than a tiger.”

“You don’t know yourself very well.”

Hardy-har. “I’ll need to be a tiger if I want to have my own global business.”

“Just don’t bite anyone.” A smile slips out, and my heart jumps. After Ma read our signs last month and pronounced us harmonious, Tom had gone strange on me, rarely smiling.

I grin back, but his gaze slides away. He pulls his newsboy cap over his head and tugs on his gloves, licking the wind one more time. Liftoff is imminent.

He yanks out the first few stakes with the spench. “Be careful near the drag rope, and don’t touch anything. By that, I mean do not make contact between yourself and any part of the Island.”

“Even my feet?”

He groans. The basket jerks as he digs out a stake. Once the last one is removed, he’ll swing over the rim like an acrobat as the balloon floats upward. My skin warms as I imagine the two of us snuggled in this bamboo capsule.

The silk deflates ever so slightly on one side. Maybe the winds are more combatant than I thought. With my hands folded behind my back, I examine the key-shaped valve on the hose that controls airflow into the balloon.

His teakwood eyes peer evenly at me. “I forgot something. Be back in a second. Don’t touch anything. Remember the kite?”

“You don’t stop mentioning it long enough for me to forget.” Last August, he told me not to let the string run on the peony kite he made me, but I couldn’t resist, and it flew right into the Pacific Ocean.

He hikes back to his cart and is soon hidden by a grove of pine trees. What did he forget? We unloaded everything—tools, ropes, and candied ginger in case of nausea.

The silk caves even more. “Tom? The Island is collapsing!” The breeze eats my words.

I tug at my hair. My arms still ache from holding up the silk as it inflated earlier. If the balloon collapses, we’ll have to come back, and we may not get another opportunity for weeks. Ba expects me at the laundry at eight, and Tom’s father rarely gives him a day off from the herb shop.

No response. I promised I wouldn’t touch anything, but surely he’d understand.

I finger the key used to regulate hot air flow into the balloon. It’s warm. I slowly twist, and within seconds, the silk becomes plump again. Ha! Easy as catching rain.

The basket suddenly lifts. Too much heat! I try to return the key to its original position, but I’m thrown off-balance as one of only four remaining stakes pops out of the ground. Four.

“Oh!” I grab onto the side of the basket, watching in horror as another stake begins to uproot, then another. In desperation, I grab again at the key but somehow pull it straight out of the socket. Heart thundering, I jam it back in, twisting and twisting, but nothing catches. The last stake unplugs like a rotting tooth, and the Island breaks free.

I start to rise, up, up, and away.

I clutch the side of the basket, hanging on for dear life. For a moment, I consider jumping off, but the balloon rises too fast, and soon I’m high enough to see Tom and Winter, his father’s draft horse, over the trees. “Tom!”

Tom tears at his hair when he sees me. He hurries back, cupping his hands to his mouth and yelling something, but the wind blows his words away. He shakes his fist. Is he angry? There’s a panicked jerkiness to his movements that I’ve never seen before.

My stomach drops as the balloon tips to one side. I glance down at the shrinking scenery, a hundred feet below me now. Ropes hang from the ring that secures the netting, but I don’t dare tamper with them, as any mistakes this high up could be catastrophic.

Ancestors! I’m not ready to join you in the afterlife.

Good-bye, solid Earth. I hope you remember how I always tried to sweep up after myself, and how I did not dig a single unnecessary hole upon your surface. Good-bye, dear Tom. There are few girls in Chinatown, but with your quick mind and warm heart, you will have your choice of any of them—just please do not choose the dainty Ling-Ling, who has held a candle for you since the fifth grade.

A flock of seagulls squawks insults beside the basket, and a cold streak runs through me. They’ll puncture the silk. “Shoo, you flying rats!”

The Island rocks and bobs, and I can barely hang on to the contents of my stomach as the seagulls swoop around me.

I never thought too hard about my convictions and wonder if it’s too late now. Ba is Catholic, but Ma prefers the traditionals—Buddhism and Taoism, sprinkled with a good dose of Confucianism, which is more of a philosophy, anyway. With Eastern religion, no one cares if you pick and choose the ingredients for your particular moral soup, as long as you have some soup, preferably one with lots of ginger and—

I remember the candied ginger in my pocket. As I unwrap the waxy package, I drop most of the candies but manage to hang onto one, and I hurl it as best I can at...

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Verlag
Speak
Erscheinungsdatum
2017
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0147516919
ISBN 13 
9780147516916
Einband
Taschenbuch
Anzahl der Seiten
416
Kontakt zum Hersteller
Nicht verfügbar
Verantwortliche Person
Buchbär
info@buchbaer.de

Weberstr. 67
Osnabrück
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