Walk Two Moons
Walk Two Moons is Sharon Creech's 1994 Newbery Medal-winning middle-grade novel, structured as a story within a story. Thirteen-year-old Salamanca Tree Hiddle is driving from her father's small Ohio house to Lewiston, Idaho, in the back of her grandparents' aging Chevrolet, racing to reach her mother by her birthday. To pass the long stretches of highway between Ohio and Idaho, Sal tells her grandparents the story of her best friend, Phoebe Winterbottom, a worried, suspicious girl whose own mother had recently and inexplicably left home, leaving behind a refrigerator full of casseroles and a household that did not know what to do with itself. As Sal tells Phoebe's story, the reader gradually realizes she is also telling her own, and that the journey to Lewiston is not what it first appeared to be. Creech writes with a light hand, working in Cherokee phrases, lyrical descriptions of the American west, and a steady undertone of grief.
Themes & atmosphere
What you might want to know about Walk Two Moons
The questions readers send us most often, answered without spoilers.
Thirteen-year-old Salamanca Tree Hiddle is in the back of her grandparents' car driving west from Ohio to Lewiston, Idaho, where her mother went and never came back.
Yes. Sharon Creech's Walk Two Moons won the Newbery Medal in 1995.
It contains real grief, but the tone is gentle and the storytelling is layered. It is widely taught in fifth and sixth grade classrooms.
Walk Two Moons was written by Sharon Creech, published in 1994 by Lectorum.
Walk Two Moons is 287 pages in standard print editions, though page counts vary slightly between hardcover, paperback, and large-print formats.
At an average reading pace of about 250 words per minute, Walk Two Moons takes most readers 4 to 6 hours to finish.
Walk Two Moons is a standalone novel by Sharon Creech, not part of a series.
Walk Two Moons is available in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats from Amazon, Bookshop.org, ThriftBooks, and most major bookstores.