A lot of Newbery reviews this past week. A Fine White Dust by Cynthia Rylant is a Newbery Honor book from 1987. This is one of those books which has benefited from a face lift. Sadly, the book that I own is the cover on the right (blech!) but I love the book cover shown here on the left. 
At 106 pages, A Fine White Dust is a very quick read. 13-year-old Pete has always loved to go to church. It has always been one of his most favorite places to be. In second-grade he’d invite himself to go with the neighbors, by fourth-grade he’d get up and go by himself, and by fifth-grade he became very serious and religious about church.
I didn’t want to go to hell. I wanted somebody to tell me I wouldn’t go to hell. I’d look at me and I’d see a boy who never did seem to be good or holy or worth anybody dying for. Just nothing real special. And I guess I wanted somebody to make me better. To save me from hell.
Pete was looking for somebody to understand him. With his best friend, an atheist and no desire from his parents to go to church, he felt alone in his desire to be close to God. To be saved. That all changes when a traveling preacher, James Carson, comes to town. Pete finds in him an answer to his prayers. Ardent with a near frenzy call to faith, Pete decides to run away with the preacher as his new disciple leaving behind his friend and family. But his is faith misplaced? When he is helplessly betrayed, Pete must come to terms with his faith in God and himself.
Pete is working out who he is independently of his parents and best friend and I really liked that about his character. He’s also very naive though, thinking that he can simply run away and begin a new life with the preacher. He learns the hard way that not everything will go according to plan and that one shouldn’t put all your eggs in one basket – so to speak. He certainly learns about heartbreak and betrayal but it also seems that his character is slightly more or less the same than at the beginning of the book.
I’m glad I read this one but also not one that will stick with me for a long time. But well worth the read because I haven’t read many books about young children who are navigating the world of faith and God. A very positive book in that regard. It is not his faith that fails (in fact – his faith in God only becomes stronger) but rather he learns to beware the folly’s of man.
Links of interest: More book blogger reviews.
Genre: Middle Grade Historical Fiction
Publisher: Atheneum. Reprint 2006. Originally published 1987.
Paperback, 112 pages. ISBN 1416927697
Source copy: Own
A Fine White Dust is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.
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