Emily Elizabeth Davis (who was named in honor of Emily Dickinson) has been told her whole life that she will be a poet, but she hates poetry. She’s been told that she will meet her father when the time is right, but she needs her father right now. When Emily loses the book containing her life story and the secret to her father’s identity, she must decide which of two paths she will follow.
Does destiny control Emily’s fate, as her mother has always told her, or does God direct her life, as her religion teacher says? Does Emily have any say in the matter? Tired of waiting, she decides to find the book herself and adventure ensues.
In Kathryn Fitzmaurice’s engaging third novel, Destiny, Rewritten, Emily enlists the help of her eccentric younger cousin Mortie and her super-smart best friend Wavey to skip school—just for one day. She gets involved with tree huggers, makes a new friend and joins a club for romance novelists, a genre she likes much better than poetry.
In the process, she begins to change into an empowered young lady, one who has the courage to tell her mother who she really wants to be: a romance novelist and not a poet. It seems that Emily is well on her way to controlling her own fate.
When Emily discovers her father’s identity, destiny may intervene before she or her mother has a chance to meet him. But Emily has changed too much to let fate ruin her plans and take away the romance novel ending she’s always longed for.
For children who feel trapped into being someone they don’t want to be, Destiny, Rewritten teaches that everyone has a choice to take actions that can lead to a better place. Fitzmaurice’s thoughtful treatment of her subject offers a lesson that young readers can appreciate and a story they won’t soon forget.
