Green Angel

HOFFMAN, Alice. Green Angel. NY: Scholastic [2003]. 8vo, [vi] 119 pp. Color pictorial boards. Olive endpapers; 6 double-page half-tone illustrations in green ink. A fine copy in original color pictorial dust jacket. Signed by the author, Alice Hoffman.

First edition. The first novel for teens by the New York Times best-selling author of Practical Magic, as well as the first book in the Green Angel duology. Left on her own when her family is lost in a terrible disaster, 15-year-old Green is haunted by loss and by the past. Struggling to survive physically and emotionally in a place where nothing seems to grow and ashes are everywhere, Green retreats into the ruined realm of her garden. But in destroying her feelings, she also begins to destroy herself, erasing the girl she'd once been as she tattoos ravens and bats into her skin. At first leaving the house only to find food, Green gradually begins to relearn the lessons of love and heal by caring for others and sharing her own story. Told in a spare, dreamy first-person narrative, Hoffman's thought-provoking images are especially poignant and powerful. An extraordinary fairy tale, a story of hope, redemption, and the ultimate power of love.