I haven't read STORMY WEATHER. I find Depression books fascinating, though, so I'll have to pick it up. Thanks for the rec!

I think you would!

How did I not think of THE HEALING SPELL? Duh. I'll add it to the readalikes list for this book. The basic story structures are very similar, as you pointed out.

You're very kind, Susan, thank you! Although I wasn't trying to prod you into adding my book as a read-alike. It just kind of bugged me that this book is so similar to mine. Maybe I'm being too sensitive, but I thought my book was pretty dern unique when I wrote it and this is so very similar in its entire premise that it honestly makes me wonder if they just changed the setting and had the dad in a coma instead of the mom because they were riffing off my book. Oh, well, I'll probably never know. Merry Christmas to you!

I'm often stumped on readalikes, so I love it when people help me out :) And ECHO MOUNTAIN really is similar in structure and theme to THE HEALING SPELL. The books have different vibes, though. You'll have to read ECHO MOUNTAIN and let me know what you think about the similarities and differences. It's been too long since I read THE HEALING SPELL for me to compare/contrast them effectively.

Thanks, Mystica! The author has a couple other books out, but this is the first one I've read by her.

For sure! I love learning about history through interesting stories. I don't really care about facts and figures, it's the human drama that captivates me.

MG novels always teach good lessons. I prefer it when they're taught in subtle ways, though, which happens in ECHO MOUNTAIN.

Right? And "slower" books are a hard sell for today's kids. Unfortunately, it seems to me that ECHO MOUNTAIN is the kind of book adults give awards to and children never read.