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Rain Shadow
Bethany knows that she is special. She doesn't learn things as easily as her classmates do and that sometimes makes them mean to her. They call her names - including the really "bad" name. Even her mom and her sister Mira say unkind things at times. But Bethany has friends like her neighbor Mrs. Goldsborough as well as happy times with Dad when he gets home from work. And now, Mira has promised to protect her from the bullies when the new school year begins. Then tragedy strikes, tearing Bethany's world apart in ways she could never have imagined, and she starts to wonder if there will ever be a place that feels like home again. Award-winning author Valerie Sherrard revisits the world of The Glory Wind in her new historical novel.
- GenresCanadaHistoricalJuvenile
152 pages, Paperback
First published November 15, 2014
7 people are currently reading
86 people want to read
About the author
Valerie Sherrard
36 books68 followersI was born in 1957 in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, and grew up in various parts of Canada. My dad was in the Air Force so the family moved often, and was sent to live in Lahr, West Germany, when I was eleven. It was there that a teacher encouraged me toward writing. I didn't rush into it, though. It wasn't until 2002 that my first book was released, but since then I've had several dozen books for young people published.
One reason I chose to write for children and teens was my experience in working with them. Over the years I fostered about 70 teens in my home, and I also worked as the Director of a group home for teens in my community for more than a decade.
One reason I chose to write for children and teens was my experience in working with them. Over the years I fostered about 70 teens in my home, and I also worked as the Director of a group home for teens in my community for more than a decade.
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Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews
November 27, 2016
I instantly fell in love with Bethany, the mentally challenged main character of RAIN SHADOW by Valerie Sherrard. I cried for her, how people treated her. And I rooted for Bethany. She's a character that readers can identify with. Readers of JACOB HAVE I LOVED by Kattherine Paterson and BLUE by Joyce Hostetter.
December 10, 2014
Beautiful & complex. Themes of love, friendship, kindness and perseverance. Readers won't help but feel heartbroken for everything Bethany goes through & admire her strength. I also love that the father in this book is super supportive and loving towards Bethany who has mental & physical challenges.
November 29, 2014
A gentle story told with brilliant simplicity. Bethany will stay with you for a long time.
May 14, 2018
For this reading cycle I read Rain Shadow by Valerie Sherrard. The genre of this book is realistic fiction because some things in this book could actually happen in real life, but some other things could not really happen. The genre realistic fiction is defined as “a genre consisting of stories that could have actually occurred to people or animals in a believable setting. These stories resemble real life, and fictional characters within these stories react similarly to real people.” This book had my emotions all over the place. I would recommend this book to a friend who enjoys stories about family trauma or drama.
This book is all about a girl named Bethany who is different from most people, she is a slower learner than the average people in her classes that are her age. The book starts out with Bethany in school struggling to learn in school and keep up with her classmates and teachers. The book is written the way that Bethany thinks and talks, so the book is kind of hard to understand at some points of the book. Towards the middle of the book Bethany’s older sister Mira gets very sick and has to stay in the hospital for a while full time. Bethany and Mira’s parents wanted to be with Mira when she was sick, but they could not take Bethany because she still had to keep attending school and trying to live her normal life. Suddenly tragedy strikes and Bethany and her family’s life is flipped upside down and her mother has completely lost it. Her mother used to be gentle to Bethany with her slow learning, but now that she is going crazy, Bethany only has her dad to talk to and depend on.
I would rate this book with ⅖ stars because I think it was interesting, but only in certain parts of the book. In the beginning of the book it was all just conversations between Bethany and her mother and father, nothing really interesting or exciting was happening. However the middle of the book when something big actually happened i was excited to read the book, and couldn’t put it down. Towards the end of the book, things slowed back down and we were just following Bethany through her daily life. Overall I think this book was good, but not the best book I’ve ever read.
This book is all about a girl named Bethany who is different from most people, she is a slower learner than the average people in her classes that are her age. The book starts out with Bethany in school struggling to learn in school and keep up with her classmates and teachers. The book is written the way that Bethany thinks and talks, so the book is kind of hard to understand at some points of the book. Towards the middle of the book Bethany’s older sister Mira gets very sick and has to stay in the hospital for a while full time. Bethany and Mira’s parents wanted to be with Mira when she was sick, but they could not take Bethany because she still had to keep attending school and trying to live her normal life. Suddenly tragedy strikes and Bethany and her family’s life is flipped upside down and her mother has completely lost it. Her mother used to be gentle to Bethany with her slow learning, but now that she is going crazy, Bethany only has her dad to talk to and depend on.
I would rate this book with ⅖ stars because I think it was interesting, but only in certain parts of the book. In the beginning of the book it was all just conversations between Bethany and her mother and father, nothing really interesting or exciting was happening. However the middle of the book when something big actually happened i was excited to read the book, and couldn’t put it down. Towards the end of the book, things slowed back down and we were just following Bethany through her daily life. Overall I think this book was good, but not the best book I’ve ever read.
April 8, 2016
I just finished reading an excellent tale of emotions with strong messages. Rain Shadow, written by Valerie Sherrard, the genre of which is Realistic Fiction, is set in the 1940’s. It is one of the most intriguing books I have read! The author clearly understands people and how their minds work. The book starts off with Bethany, a child who is ‘slow’ as she states, and her sister Mira, whose personality is sweet at times, but mostly she uses Bethany to satisfy her egotistical nature by saying things like how she is ‘a jewel’ while Bethany is ‘ a stone’. She gets teased in school for having a mental problem, and sometimes kids call her terrible things. Thankfully, Bethany is very pure-hearted and forgiving. Her father adores her, but shows equality in affection to both his children, and her mother, sadly, shows strong favouritism to Mira. One day, bunch of strangers come to the door, and the man explains that his family needs a rest stop and he is going up north. He also mentions that his boy has polio, and after a few days after the family’s departure, Mira is also diagnosed with it. Sadly, she dies, which tears their family apart. Bethany’s mother turns grief-stricken and vile after Mira’s death. Bethany soon realizes that her Mother wouldn’t have minded if BETHANY died instead of Mira, as she says: “Then tell me why! Why Jack? If we had to lose a child, why did it have to be Mira? My beautiful, perfect girl?” Things eventually resolve. Bethany makes new friends, and forgives people who have teased her before. The story goes through a progression of strong emotions, which are both heartwarming and heartbreaking. Since this book largely reflects real life, there is no ‘happy ending’.
I felt the book was very strong in a large number of areas, and ever so slightly weak in certain other aspects. Something I truly believe is strong about the book is its characters, more specifically, the way it somehow just knows how people function and how they tend to react to certain situations. For example, after Mira’s death, Bethany’s mother (who is named Inez in the story) goes into a grief-stricken paranoia, directing all her hate towards Bethany.
“Mother’s head lifted up very slow. Her face did not look right and her voice sounded strange and low.
‘Get…out….of…my…sight.’”
“I walked fast to my room and closed the door…”
“…Then I started to worry that if Mother might come to my room.
My own mother coming into my room should not be scary at all.
I tried to tell myself that. I whispered, ‘I do not have to be afraid of Mother.’
I said it over and over. Only, I did not think I was saying the truth.”
Did you not feel sad for Bethany? Did you not feel like comforting her? I certainly did. It is quotes like these that show just how much this book understands humans, and how much work the author, Valerie, put into understanding people and their personalities when certain situations and conflicts arise. People change according to different situations. They are not the same, soulless shell of a character. That is what I feel is one of the biggest strengths of this book. Another strength I found in this book are the personalities of the characters themselves. They all have extremely believable personalities, and although some are slightly repetitive, most are very creative. Mr. Fleming, who is the new neighbour of Bethany and family nearing the end of the book, is the most interesting character in the story. He lives with his wife, but she isn’t as lively a character as he is. “Mr. Fleming pushed himself up and grabbed a crutch like Mira had one time when she twisted her ankle at a picnic. My eyes opened very wide when I say why he needed it.
‘You have only one leg!’ I said, even though that was a rude thing to say…”
“‘What’? Mr. Fleming said. “‘Are you sure’?” He looked down at himself. ‘By golly, you’re right! I do only have one leg.”
“Mr. Fleming told me about how he had two legs when he was younger but then he had to go away to fight in a war and one of his legs got blown to smithereens.
Mrs. Fleming told him to tone it down a bit…”
That is just a little taste of the interesting character that Mr. Fleming is. Relating back to my previous points, the characters act a lot like real people, and they are believable. Now, I think this book is extremely good at understanding people and their behaviour, and it hardly has any flaws. However, sometimes the book’s good understanding of people leads to its shortcomings. Some of the characters are just a little bit TOO mean at times, and the realism starts to irritate you. For example, when Bethany stays at her cousins’, they constantly tease her, and Bethany gets annoyed and bites them. After that, they are even meaner to her, which makes no sense to me. When they are playing hide and seek, this happens:
“Kenny was It. When he started to count, I went and hid in the closet by the front door where everybody hangs their coats. I waited and waited but Kenny did not find me.”
“After a while I heard my cousins laughing and talking quiet.
I do not want to cry, only I could not help it…”
“I tried to be quiet but Rose heard me. She came and pulled the closet door open.”
“’That’s a good girl,’ she said. ‘Come on now.’
I shook my head. That made Rose angry. She told me to stop being a baby and come out this minute. I did not move. She reached in and grabbed my arm and tried to pull me out. So I bit her hand.
‘That halfwit bit me,’ she whispered to him. ‘Can you believe that?’
‘Leave her in there if that’s how she’s going to act,’ Kenny said.”
In my opinion, I see no wrong in what Bethany did. I may not have bit Rose, but I certainly would be enraged. Teasing me and leaving me out of games? That is certainly not a nice way to act. We learn later that the cousins don’t have mean personalities, so what was the point of this? Scenes like these really irritated me because they were a little too realistic, and it’s never nice to read about character (s) who is/are OVER-mean.
From everything I have stated above, I give this book’s final rating 4.5 out of 5 stars. It is an amazing, emotional, and intellectual novel that is definitely worth looking into. It made me feel like running to Bethany and giving her a hug at times, only to realize that she doesn’t actually exist. You will get sucked into its story. The only criticism I have is the realism can get a bit TOO real and become ‘fake’ at times, but that is not a huge problem, and you will likely ignore it, or not even spot it.
In conclusion, this book is a delight to read, and although depressing at times, its lighthearted and forgiving nature of the main character will surely make you feel like the world can always be a good place, even in the bleakest, darkest of hours. In fact, I suggest you go and read it right now! Form your own opinion of the book, like I did with this review! Go on!
I felt the book was very strong in a large number of areas, and ever so slightly weak in certain other aspects. Something I truly believe is strong about the book is its characters, more specifically, the way it somehow just knows how people function and how they tend to react to certain situations. For example, after Mira’s death, Bethany’s mother (who is named Inez in the story) goes into a grief-stricken paranoia, directing all her hate towards Bethany.
“Mother’s head lifted up very slow. Her face did not look right and her voice sounded strange and low.
‘Get…out….of…my…sight.’”
“I walked fast to my room and closed the door…”
“…Then I started to worry that if Mother might come to my room.
My own mother coming into my room should not be scary at all.
I tried to tell myself that. I whispered, ‘I do not have to be afraid of Mother.’
I said it over and over. Only, I did not think I was saying the truth.”
Did you not feel sad for Bethany? Did you not feel like comforting her? I certainly did. It is quotes like these that show just how much this book understands humans, and how much work the author, Valerie, put into understanding people and their personalities when certain situations and conflicts arise. People change according to different situations. They are not the same, soulless shell of a character. That is what I feel is one of the biggest strengths of this book. Another strength I found in this book are the personalities of the characters themselves. They all have extremely believable personalities, and although some are slightly repetitive, most are very creative. Mr. Fleming, who is the new neighbour of Bethany and family nearing the end of the book, is the most interesting character in the story. He lives with his wife, but she isn’t as lively a character as he is. “Mr. Fleming pushed himself up and grabbed a crutch like Mira had one time when she twisted her ankle at a picnic. My eyes opened very wide when I say why he needed it.
‘You have only one leg!’ I said, even though that was a rude thing to say…”
“‘What’? Mr. Fleming said. “‘Are you sure’?” He looked down at himself. ‘By golly, you’re right! I do only have one leg.”
“Mr. Fleming told me about how he had two legs when he was younger but then he had to go away to fight in a war and one of his legs got blown to smithereens.
Mrs. Fleming told him to tone it down a bit…”
That is just a little taste of the interesting character that Mr. Fleming is. Relating back to my previous points, the characters act a lot like real people, and they are believable. Now, I think this book is extremely good at understanding people and their behaviour, and it hardly has any flaws. However, sometimes the book’s good understanding of people leads to its shortcomings. Some of the characters are just a little bit TOO mean at times, and the realism starts to irritate you. For example, when Bethany stays at her cousins’, they constantly tease her, and Bethany gets annoyed and bites them. After that, they are even meaner to her, which makes no sense to me. When they are playing hide and seek, this happens:
“Kenny was It. When he started to count, I went and hid in the closet by the front door where everybody hangs their coats. I waited and waited but Kenny did not find me.”
“After a while I heard my cousins laughing and talking quiet.
I do not want to cry, only I could not help it…”
“I tried to be quiet but Rose heard me. She came and pulled the closet door open.”
“’That’s a good girl,’ she said. ‘Come on now.’
I shook my head. That made Rose angry. She told me to stop being a baby and come out this minute. I did not move. She reached in and grabbed my arm and tried to pull me out. So I bit her hand.
‘That halfwit bit me,’ she whispered to him. ‘Can you believe that?’
‘Leave her in there if that’s how she’s going to act,’ Kenny said.”
In my opinion, I see no wrong in what Bethany did. I may not have bit Rose, but I certainly would be enraged. Teasing me and leaving me out of games? That is certainly not a nice way to act. We learn later that the cousins don’t have mean personalities, so what was the point of this? Scenes like these really irritated me because they were a little too realistic, and it’s never nice to read about character (s) who is/are OVER-mean.
From everything I have stated above, I give this book’s final rating 4.5 out of 5 stars. It is an amazing, emotional, and intellectual novel that is definitely worth looking into. It made me feel like running to Bethany and giving her a hug at times, only to realize that she doesn’t actually exist. You will get sucked into its story. The only criticism I have is the realism can get a bit TOO real and become ‘fake’ at times, but that is not a huge problem, and you will likely ignore it, or not even spot it.
In conclusion, this book is a delight to read, and although depressing at times, its lighthearted and forgiving nature of the main character will surely make you feel like the world can always be a good place, even in the bleakest, darkest of hours. In fact, I suggest you go and read it right now! Form your own opinion of the book, like I did with this review! Go on!
March 7, 2016
I liked the heroine in all her disabilities her heart was bigger and stronger like that plant that grows in the "Rain Shadow". I've been hanging out in the shadow and there's lots cherishto and .
I have been hanging out in the shadow and there is lots to learn and cherish. I liked the heroine in all her disabilities because her heart was bigger and stronger, like the plant that manages to sink deep roots and grow strong in the Rain shadow! I really enjoyed it.
I have been hanging out in the shadow and there is lots to learn and cherish. I liked the heroine in all her disabilities because her heart was bigger and stronger, like the plant that manages to sink deep roots and grow strong in the Rain shadow! I really enjoyed it.
November 16, 2015
Rain Shadow by Valerie Sherrard. An awesome book! The story about a special girl with a limp and how hard it is to live with name calling and just meanness. Bethany tells her story and the feelings she hides from the people she loves. I love the title and how the title connects well with the storyline.
February 26, 2016
Beautiful story of a beautiful girl. I loved the supporting cast and how they all treated Bethany differently, because that made it real. I stayed up late and read the book in one sitting and, yes, I cried. Kudos to the author!
February 11, 2016
Absolutely loved the voice of Bethany! Brilliant cover too!
May 12, 2016
A perfect little book. No words missing. No words unneeded. Real people living real lives in a story that deserved to be shared.
June 8, 2016
amazing book
i read it for the forest of reading!
i read it for the forest of reading!
February 11, 2016
Very sad
May 17, 2018
This book teaches about multiple disorders through mother daughter relationship and how everyone is different and this is a prime example of that. Bethany really wanted her mom to love her the same even with a disorder only soon to find out that her mom also develops a disability as well - not being in control of her emotions, particularly anger. Lots of things can and should be learned through this book.
May 2, 2021
I loved this book with everything in me. I read it for the first time in elementary school and have re-read it many times since. It was the first book I read that got me into loving reading as a whole.
August 31, 2020
Really enjoyed this book as a kid.
April 14, 2022
I almost cried. It was a really good but sad book.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 26, 2025
This book had me on the verge of tears!
Bethany is such a beloved character that you can easily sympathize with.
Bethany is such a beloved character that you can easily sympathize with.
November 26, 2015
Good, but sad. Reading about what negativity and insults Bethany has to face from schoolmates, adults and family was quite depressing. It was very nice to see someone writing the character of a supportive, loving father who shows emotions and is strong and kind. It is not a character that is often seen in chapter books for kids.
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November 17, 2015terribly sad.
April 16, 2016
I can see why this book is shortlisted, it is a great story, well-told as usual with all of Ms. Sherrard's books. To get the most out of it, Glory Wind (also by Ms. Sherrard) should be read first.
February 15, 2022
I loved this book so much when I was in 6th grade . I'm now 16 and still think about it. It was a beautiful story and I'm so glad that I read it.
January 6, 2016
An emotional story of a young girl who experiences a lot of heartbreak in her life.
April 20, 2017
Good. This book was definitely a bit darker than I thought it would be but showcased some very important themes.
June 5, 2017
Great book but I wish it was longer.
January 24, 2019
This is one of my favorites. It’s a nice quick read for on the go. I definitely recommend it for anyone.
Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews