I am thrilled to be hosting a spot on the THE IMPOSSIBLE DESTINY OF CUTIE GRACKLE by Shawn K. Stout Blog Tour hosted by Rockstar Book Tours. Check out my post and make sure to enter the giveaway!
About The Book:
Author: Shawn K. Stout
Pub. Date: May 31, 2022
Publisher: Peachtree
Formats: Hardcover, eBook, Audiobook
Pages: 336
Find it: Goodreads, Amazon, Kindle, Audible, B&N, iBooks, Kobo, TBD, Bookshop.org
Do you believe in impossible things? Cutie Grackle does. She has to. Otherwise, she’ll never be more than a lonely 10 year old in a cursed family.
Cutie Grackle is used to being different—she lives alone on a mountain with her
feeble-minded uncle, and when she’s not sucking pebbles to trick her stomach
into feeling full, she’s chatting with a weathered garden gnome for company.
But having a flock of ravens follow you is more than just different. Cutie
worries the birds are connected to the curse Uncle Horace tends to mutter
about. And she’s right.
The ravens present her with a fortune from a cookie, and when she touches it
she’s pulled into a vision from her family’s past. It involves the curse and
her long-lost mother. The birds offer up a series of objects, each imbued with
memories that eventually reveal Cutie must do what her mother could not: break
the curse.
Part outdoor survival adventure, part fantastical quest, Shawn K. Stout’s The
Impossible Destiny of Cutie Grackle is a journey of hope, heart, and a
willingness to believe in the impossible.
THE BIRDS WERE FOLLOWING ME.
Which was a very irregular thing, even for me. My life was full of the kinds of things people
might call irregular, but up until then, not one of them had to do with birds. I knew it could
only mean one thing: Either I stunk of worms, or something bad was fixin’ to happen.
Jefferson’s old pickup truck, watching the trees fly by the window, when I spotted the birds for
the third time that morning. They were ravens. Five of them.
“One of these days, I’m going to take me a tropical vacation,” said Toot. “When I get lucky.”
washed. “Oh, I don’t know the particulars,” she said, “but one of these days my ship will come
in. Believe you me.” I stuck my head out of the window to get a better look at the birds. The
warm June wind tickled my face. They were doing a pretty fine job of keeping up with us,
those birds. Although, considering how tenderfooted Toot was with the gas pedal, it couldn’t
have been awful hard. “But there aren’t any ports in West Virginia,” I said, leaning back inside
the truck. That was the problem with living in a landlocked state; there was no easy way out.
“A minor technicality.” Toot was gripping the top of the steering wheel with both hands. Each
of her plump fingers was outfitted with a ring, which she clacked against the wheel. Clack.
Clack. “I read about a woman who woke up one morning with the firmly held belief that she
would win the lottery even though she had never gambled before in all her life. So she bought
herself a ticket. And the next thing she knew, she was a super-mega jackpot winner and on the
front page of all the papers. Now she owns a chain of islands. Not just one island, a whole
chain. Can you believe such a thing?”
the color of a chili pepper, swept her chin. The road to the nearest town, Gypsum, was steep,
and Toot badgered the brake the whole way.
finished fifth grade. Toot saw it as her own personal concern to look in on me, especially
during the summer, and once a month, she drove me down to Gypsum’s No Hunger Food
Pantry, where I could get food for myself and my uncle, Horace.
“Birds?” Toot adjusted her rearview mirror. “I think they’re following me,” I said. “I saw them
back at Horace’s place, and now here they are again.” “Following you?” said Toot. She
clobbered the brakes, sending me into the dashboard.
nests. They lay eggs. Such is the uncomplicated life of a bird. We should all be so lucky.” She
frowned and kept her eyes on me until I looked away.
sick. “Now then,” Toot said, easing off the brake for a bit and then smashing it again. “How’s it
been?” I tugged at a loose thread on the cuff of my jeans. “There’s something wrong with
Horace.” Toot raised her eyebrows at me, and I said, “I mean, more wrong than usual. Lately
all he does is sleep. Unless he’s running around with Charlie Mullet. He was gone three days
and then came back last night, muttering to himself about the curse again. And sometimes, he
just stares out the window, you know? At nothing. Like he’s here, but he’s not really here. Like
his mind is caught someplace else.” Clack. Clack.
he kept himself away from most people, and he never was much for talking. When he did have
something to say, he didn’t make a whole lot of sense. He talked in circles, and even triangles
and rectangles, but never in straight lines. He believed that a curse was set on him and our
family, and that’s the reason we lived the way we did, him and me. The reason my parents
went away. He wouldn’t say anything more about the curse than that, not that I believed him
much, anyhow.
ever since Charlie Mullet came back around, something was different. It was like there was a
curtain pulled tight around Horace that kept him in a dark place, that kept him from being in
the world that everybody else lived in, including mine.
been?” Clack. Clack.
would believe they were true. Nothing good would come from Toot worrying any more than
she already did.
speed. “Your life’s gonna change in a heartbeat. Just that quick.”
We hit a deep pothole. I bobbed in my seat, and the coil springs underneath me sproinged.
them. “Sugar, I’ve got to tell you something. I’m going away for a little while.”
on her last days. Last days, that’s what she said. She was going to drive all night, the good Lord
willing, across the great state of West Virginia to Charles Town, where her mother lived. She
didn’t know how long she would be gone. Maybe a few weeks. Maybe more.
I wrapped the loose thread from my jeans tight around my finger. Like I was holding onto the
world and trying to steer it around a bend. “Can I come with you?”
again. “I don’t think Horace would like it.”
smaller. “She’s about to leave this world, and the manner in which she’s gonna do that may
not be something you want to see.”
leave mine. The wind untucked my hair from behind my ear.
are for you right now, well, that’s not the way things would be.”
too impossible to fit inside. Like waking up one day and, just like that, finding that everything
was different. Easier. We were quiet for a long time.
about your age. Sometimes the stories came from a book, but most of the time, I think she just
made them up on the spot. But before she got going with a story, she always told me to keep
my eye on the luminaries.”
ones. The ones who look into the belly of the dark forest and see a way through when nobody
else can. By the end, some of them even made it to the highfalutin castle. And you, Cutie
Grackle, you’ve got the makings of a luminary. You’ve just got to do what I’m always telling
you.”
About Shawn K. Stout:
Shawn K.
Stout is the author of several books for young readers, including A
Tiny Piece of Sky (Philomel/PRH), which was a Bank Street Best Book.
Shawn holds an MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults from Vermont
College of Fine Arts. She lives in Maryland with her family. Visit her at www.shawnkstout.com
Website | Twitter | Instagram | Goodreads | Amazon | BookBub
Giveaway Details
1 winner will receive a finished copy of THE IMPOSSIBLE DESTINY OF CUTIE GRACKLE, US Only.
a Rafflecopter giveawayTour Schedule:
Week One:
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7/4/2022 |
Excerpt/IG Post |
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7/4/2022 |
Excerpt |
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7/5/2022 |
IG Review |
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7/5/2022 |
Excerpt/IG Post |
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7/6/2022 |
Review |
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7/6/2022 |
Excerpt/IG Post |
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7/7/2022 |
IG Post |
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7/7/2022 |
Review/IG Post |
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7/8/2022 |
Review/IG Post |
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7/8/2022 |
Review/IG Post |
Week Two:
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7/11/2022 |
IG Review |
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7/11/2022 |
IG Review |
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7/12/2022 |
Excerpt/IG Post |
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7/12/2022 |
Review/IG Post |
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7/13/2022 |
Review/IG Post |
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7/13/2022 |
Review/IG Post |
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7/14/2022 |
Review/IG Post |
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7/14/2022 |
Review/IG Post |
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7/15/2022 |
Review/ |
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7/15/2022 |
Review/IG Post |
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