Gaps in Stone Walls

In the late 1800s, hereditary deafness touched a large share of the families in Chilmark, a town on Martha's Vineyard, and twelve-year-old Merry Skiffe is one of the island's deaf residents. A gifted young artist, Merry finds her quiet life upended when Ned Nickerson, a wealthy and widely disliked miser, is found murdered on a dark road one Saturday night. She is one of only four townspeople with no alibi, and fearing she will disgrace her family, she runs away, hoping to slip off the island with a cousin who plans to elope. As she travels in secret across pastures and along the island's stone walls, memories of her childhood show how she has learned to make her way in a hearing world. John Neufeld's historical mystery gives middle-grade readers a vivid portrait of a real and unusual island community.