One thing is certain when reading the 25 novels of Avi; there is no predicting what to expect from this gifted author. In 1990, "The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle," an adventure on the high seas, won the Newbery Honor as did "Nothing But the Truth," a raucous high school story that jars the sensibilities, in 1991. These follow "Wolf Rider" (1985), a mystery thriller and a comedy, "S.O.R. Losers" (1984).
Avi admits he likes the challenge of doing something different. "My strength as a writer is my strength as a reader. I read everything.""Blue Heron" has a strain of quiet juxtaposed against family conflict as 12-year-old Maggie goes to spend a month on a secluded pond with her father, his young wife and their new baby girl. The tension of her abusive father and the constant care required for the baby, Linda, is alleviated by Maggie's discovery of an exquisite blue heron in the marsh. Every morning she enjoys her solitude on a rock watching the grand movements of the bird and its early feeding.
Avi is adept at describing the heron's magisterial movements in the mist and its effect on Maggie. "The heron began to move in its astonishingly slow way, lifting one stalk-like leg at a time. Only once did Maggie see it make its lightning move to snap up something to eat. . . . She could feel the bird's lemon-colored eyes staring right at her.
"Sometimes Maggie . . . conjured up notions that it was a transformed god - it happened all the time in the old myths. . . . She told herself stories about how she might release it from its heron shape."
But Maggie is aware she is being watched. Tucker, a boy her own age, is stalking the bird with a bow and arrow. Maggie confronts the boy and realizes they have something in common, needing seclusion to tolerate the tirades of explosive fathers.
There are the expected "growing up" signals such as when Maggie watches the heron, "she began to speculate what it would be like it she could be as beautiful and graceful, calm and self-contained, as oblivious to the rest of the world as the heron seemingly was." But there are also some surprises that add to the action and the satisfying resolution. One of these is that Maggie learns to love the young woman, her stepmother, who has found a place in her father's life and realizes that the affection is reciprocal. Also, Tucker gives a gift to Maggie the morning she leaves the pond, his bow without a string and all the arrows broken.
The most tender moment is when Maggie is rewarded for her morning vigil with patience and approaches the magnificent bird and touches "a breath of finger to feathers."
Avi seems to have no trouble in relating to the variety of characters that he writes about. Particularly this is true of Maggie. "I like her. This is a rare book for me in that I was thinking of someone very specific. I originally used her real name, and it was hard to give that up. She's the daughter of a single parent, a very old friend of my wife's. I do have great affection for the young girl, for the real one and the fictional one. And for the father. I've come to realize that as a writer you have to love your characters. I guess it's the way you love people. You have to take them for what they are."
The publishers have listed grades 5-8 as the appropriate age, but anyone who delights in the solitude of a marshland will enjoy "Blue Heron."