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Category:
Women
Publisher: iUniverse.com
ISBN-10: 1491715901
Type: Fiction
Pages: 350
Copyright: Feb 10, 2014
ISBN-13: 9781491715901
Price: $3.99 (eBook)
Four women come together to defend their community's park.
Eva Kaufman, a teen, and Amanda Walters, a middle-aged woman, both enjoy Liberty Park. But Liberty Park is in danger. The B & L Foundation is eager to cut down the big trees and cover the green lawns of the park with a sports complex, a hotel and a botanical garden. The nature lovers of this over-built community prefer trees, grass and birds to concrete structures. Eva and Amanda, together with their friends, join the battle to defend their park. Public hearings turn into intense arguments. Propaganda campaigns turn into threats. Espionage, sabotage and open battles in the park occur as the entire community struggles over what to do with the parkland.
GO TO LIBERTY is for those who are concerned with environmental issues, written by a woman who joined her community in fighting to save their favorite park.
Patricia Hilliard has been an environmentalist and activist for over ten years. Scenes in the book are based on her experience as a park worker, activist and bird watcher.
Excerpt
From the beginning of its life, a bird knew it was a bird, and knew exactly what a bird should do. Eva watched as sunlight glinted off the metallic-blue wings of a tree swallow. The slim fast-flying bird arced over the fresh-cut grass with one wing pointed to the sky and the other pointed to the earth. Instantly, it turned like a stunt kite and circled back in the opposite direction. Eva walked toward the bird then stopped. She stood and watched as the bird merged with several other swallows darting back and forth over the park lawn.
Eva hugged herself and smiled. The birds were so beautiful. They flew so gracefully. How wonderful it would be to fly. Birds made flying look easy, made life seem so simple.
If only life could be so simple for humans. Eva was facing the complicated decision of what to do with her life. She was eighteen years old and needed to choose an occupation so she could earn money to buy life’s necessities. She understood this. Mom had explained how important this is, but Eva wanted an occupation that was important, where she could do something for the greater good.
Was that too much to expect?
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The story covers Eva's growing interests in nature and the need to protect it from powerful interests that only seek to exploit it. Working for the park as a summer employee brings some satisfaction when she's a high school student, but as she becomes an adult and grows fond of one young man, Matt, with whom she has shared interests, the world begins to call to her. Still, she learns that, while seeing the world is exciting, the need to protect their local natural areas will always be necessary and important.
Written in a straightforward, knowledgeable style, the author shares her own experiences of Liberty Park. Names of plants, birds, and tidbits of natural history and ecology gives the story an educational flair. The struggle to protect the natural land near the park, provides conflict, adventure, and hopefulness. A wonderful story with a message that young and old can enjoy and appreciate.
The story perfectly illustrates the multipurpose function of outdoor spaces. It also uses the fiction approach to share the extremely real issue of the loss of green spaces. The standoff between man and machines was moving and meaningful. This book left me ready to opt outside and get involved within our park system. As author Patricia Hilliard writes, "The park means so much to so many people." We shouldn't lose sight of the beauty and wonder that our natural outdoor spaces provide and this book did an excellent job of reminding me of just that!
Without providing any spoilers to future readers, I felt like the book ended exactly how it should have! I was extremely pleased with the development of Eva and how her character's story was left at the end of the novel. Congratulations to Ms. Hilliard on this wonderful novel.