From Newbery Medal-winning author Paula Fox,an isolated young girl discovers surprising revelations about her grandmother-and herself.

Eleven-and-a-half-year-old Elizabeth Benedict is furious when she finds out she'll be spending a month with her grandmother in Maine. She's sure she's being packed off to a remote island to live in a cottage without electricity or plumbing so that her parents can be alone with her new baby brother.

While her grandmother spends her days painting, Elizabeth explores the island. She is drawn to Aaron, the strange son of their only neighbors. One day, something happens that changes everything-and reveals the real reason she was sent to Pring Island.

A School Library Journal Best Book of the Year, this incandescent novel takes on themes of isolation, creativity, and family as an elderly woman confronts her own mortality with acceptance and dignity.