The Next Great Jane - Hardcover

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

K. L. Going is the award-winning author of multiple books for children and teens. She received a Michael Printz Honor for her teen novel, Fat Kid Rules the World, which was made into a feature film. Her beloved middle-grade novel, The Libera­tion of Gabriel King, was an IRA Notable Book for a Global Society, a CBC Children’s Choice, was nominated for eleven state awards, and is taught in classrooms around the world. Her books have been Booksense picks, Scholastic Book Club choices, Junior Library Guild selec­tions, and have been published worldwide. She currently writes and teaches Language Arts and writing to seventh and eighth graders at a Montessori school, and lives in New York with her family.

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Chapter One

Nothing important ever happened in Whickett Harbor, Maine. So, it figured that the two biggest things to hit the town in a decade would occur on the exact same night. One of them even threatened to cancel out the other, but I was not about to let a hurricane keep me from meeting a best-selling author.

Little did I know, the hurricane would bring more trouble than I bargained for, including: the most annoying boy I’d ever met, a night of disaster, and worst of all . . . my mother, fresh from Hollywood.

Well, you know what they say: A good story is full of trouble.

“Emmett? Jane? Anyone home?” The voice drifting through the front door belonged to the coolest person I knew. Ana Taylor was my babysitter, our housekeeper, car fixer-upper, weekly planner, and all around Most Important Person Ever. Without Ana, Dad and I would be lost.

“In here!” me and Dad called out at the exact same time.

For Dad, “in here” meant he had his head stuck in the refrigerator, making sure he wasn’t missing any stray jars of seawater. He’s an ocean scientist, and there’s only one way to describe how he feels about his plankton samples: true love.

For me, “in here” meant I was in my writing nook. Our old-fashioned kitchen has a huge cupboard set into the wall that used to have shelves until Ana knocked the top ones out with a sledge hammer. As long as I bring a flashlight, it’s the best place to create, like I’m in a hobbit hole or a secret compartment.

Ana sighed. “Should’ve known. Either of you planning on emerging any time soon?”

I swung open the cupboard door and jumped down. “Please, please tell me that the library event hasn’t been canceled.”

“Hello to you too, Jane.” Ana tousled my hair. She’s known me since I was in kindergarten, so she’s allowed. “It’s still on. They really don’t want to call it off.”

In the whole history of the town, there had never been an event of this magnitude, and if we canceled now, J. E. Fairfax might never come back.

Ana frowned. “Emmett?”

Dad tried to emerge from the refrigerator, bumped his head, then smacked his hand when he went to touch the bumped spot. Dad is tall, built like a lumberjack with broad shoulders, and he frequently collides with the furniture in our old house. “Ooh. Oh. Ouch. Sorry. Hello, Ana.”

He scrunched up his nose and chuckled as if he knew exactly how nerdy he was.

“You’re staying home tonight, right?” Ana pressed. “Weather report says the brunt of the storm won’t hit until ten, but the wind’s picking up already.”

Dad shook his head. “Got to get these samples to the lab in case our power goes out. I’ll probably sleep there. Need to make sure nothing gets damaged.”

Dad regularly gathered samples on his boat and then carted them home until he could return to the lab. It was a standing rule that no one ever ate or drank anything from our fridge that wasn’t clearly labeled.

“Really?” Ana frowned. “Shouldn’t you stay here with Jane?”

My father scratched his chin as if that idea hadn’t occurred to him. “Right. Yes. Maybe I should come back. It’s just . . .” He gave Ana the pleading face he reserved for convincing her to work extra hours. “These samples are invaluable resources for the oceanography community around the globe. If anything happened at the lab, we’d have lost them.”

He seemed to think we should be horrified at the idea.

Ana put her hands on both hips. “Oh no, Emmett Brannen. Those big brown eyes of yours aren’t going to sway me this time. The fact is, you wouldn’t have to worry about these samples if you’d learned to work the generator like I told you.”

Dad looked shame-faced. The thing about generators is that they aren’t as simple as most people think. You don’t just throw a switch when your power goes out. You’ve got to maintain a generator—turn it on periodically and make sure all of the spark plugs and such are working. I’d heard Ana remind Dad about it a hundred times, but no matter what, when it came time to flick that switch, our generator was never in working condition.

Ana was a petite blond spitfire. She could chop a cord of wood, outwork half the men in the Whickett Harbor Volunteer Fire Department, and fix your flatbed truck in her spare time. The only thing Dad could do with your flatbed truck was remember where he parked it.

If you were lucky.

“Ana,” he said, “these are red tide samples from off Monhegan Island.”

She just narrowed her eyes.

Dad shuffled his feet. “Well . . . Jane could come with me and we could sleep at the lab.”

“No. Way.” I shook my head. “I am not missing J. E. Fairfax’s talk. You know I’ve been waiting for this forever.”

Dad raised one eyebrow in my direction. “Forever, huh? You’re only twelve. Besides, she doesn’t even write for kids; she writes trashy romance novels. I’m pretty sure all of her advice will be aimed at adults.”

“Her novels are not trashy, Dad,” I argued. “The New York Times called them ‘sweeping, romantic sagas full of high drama.’” The library had used that quote on their posters, and I’d memorized it because it sounded incredible. “Every one of her books is a best seller, and three of them have been made into movies.”

Ana grinned dreamily. “I adore her movies. There are always two people who are meant for each other, but they can’t see the truth until fate forces them together.”

“Remember that one with the guy in the military who moved away from his childhood sweetheart? Then years later they found each other again—”

“Oh, I loved that one!” Ana clapped excitedly.

Dad cleared his throat, giving us his best bewildered expression. “Could we get back to the point? Ana, could you, possibly—”

“Uh-uh.” Ana crossed her arms over her chest. “I need to be at my apartment to look in on Mrs. Wallace next door. She practically had a conniption when I left to get Jane. She’s so worked up about this storm, she’ll probably have a stroke.”

“We could do rock, paper, scissors,” Dad suggested.

Ana threw her hands up. “No! We couldn’t. You need to stay home with your daughter. Period!”

There was a long moment of silence where none of us said a word, but finally my father relented. “Okay. You’re right. I’ll pick Jane up at the library after these samples are stored properly, and I’ll ask Marty to check in on the lab later tonight.”

Ana beamed. “Thank you. I knew you’d make the right choice.” She practically glowed.

Dad ran a hand through his sandy blond hair, making it stick out in weird directions. “Well, I’d better get moving if I’m going to be back in time. Thanks for dropping Jane off at the author thing.” He picked up one of the coolers, then paused. “You know you’re amazing, right?”

Dad had been telling Ana that for years. She blushed and made the same scoffing noise she usually made.

As Dad walked past, he nudged me in the ribs. “Have fun. Remember this night when you’re supporting me in my old age with the...