A Stone's Throw from Paradise by Linda Oatman High

And so Sahara keeps her pregnancy a secret, as she struggles with three choices: keep, give away, or lose. She won t tell Dustin, her total loser of an ex boyfriend. After all, what would people in her small Texas town think of her? As her sister once told her, Good girls keep their legs together. Sahara faces her crisis alone, afraid to tell her mother, afraid to tell her sister, and afraid to tell her friends. She feels as if she no longer lives on earth, but on another planet. Suddenly, Sahara s life before the stick turned pink seems to belong to another girl. She was saving money to buy a car, and dreamed of driving to Hollywood or Dollywood. Only last week, she was voted the Dixie Queen at school, and wore a sequined gown and a tiara. Instead, the stick turns pink and Sahara’s life is changed in a heart beat. She waits three long minutes, praying to Jesus, Mary, and all the saints that the stick will turn blue, meaning she isn t pregnant. This inspiring romp of a coming of age story, written entirely in Laura’s in your face slam poetry style, proves you don’t have to give up your home to live your dream.įor sixteen year old Sahara, life and death and everything in between depends on the color of a little stick. The girls and their fresh style of poetry take the city by storm, but when Laura’s father back in Pennsylvania has a heart attack, she must face her fears about home and the still raw loss of her mother.

On the way to a slam poetry contest in New Jersey, they hit a pig, get pulled over by the cops, fight with one of the judges, lose the contest, get into two more fender benders, fight with each other, and finally land on the front page of a New York City newspaper for their amazing impromptu performance at the famous Tavern on the Green. Laura Crapper, a seventeen year old combat boot wearing poet with spiked red hair, renames herself Sister Slam and hits the road with her best friend, Twig. Sister Slam and the Poetic Motormouth Road Trip

A Stone's Throw from Paradise by Linda Oatman High