Tending to Grace

Tending to Grace (2004), a contemporary novel for young adults by American author Kimberly Newton Fusco, tells the story of 14-year old Cornelia Thornhill, whose neglectful mother, Lenore, moves to Las Vegas with her boyfriend, leaving Cornelia behind with an elderly great-aunt. Cornelia struggles with a pronounced stutter, hiding it by refusing to speak. Now, angry and abandoned, Cornelia wants nothing to do with her eccentric aunt and her rural lifestyle. Slowly, Cornelia gains confidence and finds her voice. With short, poignant chapters and lyrical prose, Fusco explores issues of self-identity and the healing power of relationships. Tending to Grace won the 2006 Schneider Family Book Award given to novels that embody “the artistic expression of the disability experience for child and adolescent audiences.”

Cornelia, the story’s first-person narrator, calls herself a “bookworm, a bibliophile, a passionate lover of books.” But none of her teachers know this. Because she stutters, Cornelia will not speak in school. Consequentially, she is placed in remedial classes and given easy-reader versions of classics she has already read. Cornelia is bright and should be in honors classes, but by first grade, she “already hated talking” and learned that it is “better to keep stuff inside.” Her silence isolates her from the other students, which is fine with Cornelia. She is “a shadow.” She tries to avoid notice and expectations. Instead, Cornelia focuses her attention on her negligent mother, Lenore. Cornelia is Lenore’s caretaker. Cornelia does the cooking, cleans the house, gets her mother out of bed, and eases her into a better mood. This role gives Cornelia purpose, she says, “I feel strong in the fixing.”

Lenore and her new boyfriend, Joe, decide to move to Las Vegas, but they don’t want Cornelia along. They take Cornelia out of ninth grade before school ends in May and drop her off at her Great Aunt Agatha’s ramshackle New England Farm. Cornelia has never met Agatha before and finds her odd, irritating, and embarrassing. Cornelia compares herself to the orphan character Oliver Twist, wondering how Oliver managed without a mother. Cornelia imagines running after Joe’s car or climbing the nearby hill to follow her mother. Cornelia, a city girl from New York, has a hard time getting used to Agatha’s decidedly untidy home and strange country ways.



Agatha, tall, gray-haired, and opinionated, is a vegetarian who grows her own produce and gathers wild edibles like mushrooms and fiddlehead ferns. Agatha does not have a lot of money, and her old home is in disrepair. Cornelia doesn’t like the holes in the screens, the dust, the dirt in the garden, the mouse poop in the cupboard, or the outhouse that Agatha has named Esther—hoping that by treating Esther right and giving her a name, she won’t fall over. Cornelia, admitting that she wants “a tidy life,” cleans Agatha’s home from top to bottom.

Agatha says that she “don’t know nothin’ about livin’ with a young girl,” and initially she and Cornelia argue and have trouble communicating. Agatha refuses to speak for Cornelia when they meet other people, saying that Cornelia needs to stand on her own two feet, no matter how painful her stutter is. Agatha thinks Cornelia is hiding in her books and avoiding life.

Occasionally, Cornelia receives a short, one-line postcard from her mother—none of which have a return address. Cornelia waits futilely for her mother to come to get her, until one day she can’t take Agatha anymore and packs her suitcase and runs away. Agatha brings her home, confiding that she understands how hard it is to be alone. Agatha tells Cornelia about her little baby girl, Grace, who died as an infant. Cornelia still refuses to open up.



Cornelia meets and befriends Bo, a girl from a neighboring farm. Agatha supplies Bo’s family with vegetables, and they return the favor with fresh bread. Bo calls Agatha the “Crow Lady.” Bo wants to learn to read, but her hostile father won’t pay for her to go to summer school. Cornelia offers to teach her. While she gives reading lessons to Bo, Cornelia discovers that Agatha can’t read either, and she offers to teach her. When Bo’s father refuses to let Bo go to Agatha’s house for lessons, Cornelia angrily stands up for Bo and herself, telling him Bo needs to read to be able to go to college. Cornelia is disappointed when her mother does not return in time for her birthday.

Cornelia comes to appreciate Agatha’s eccentricities and her connection to nature. Agatha builds Cornelia a tepee, where she can go to have a quiet space all to herself. Deciding she doesn’t want to hide anymore, Cornelia begins writing her life story. She finally finds the courage to tell the librarian her name despite her stutter and receives a long-coveted library card. She goes to school and refuses to attend the remedial English class. The principal gives her a chance in honors English. Cornelia feels herself begin to bloom. Agatha takes Cornelia up the nearby hillside and shows her all the land that belongs to the family. Agatha thinks she might sell a piece of land to get the money to send Cornelia to college. Cornelia hugs Agatha for the first time. Together they visit Grace’s memorial. Agatha comments that there is a lot of pain in life, but even more joy, and people must learn to live through both.

Cornelia’s mother shows up in December and tells her she and her boyfriend are now moving to Atlantic City. She promises to have Cornelia join them soon. Cornelia decides to stay with Agatha.