Clara is a fourteen-year-old girl with Down syndrome who decides, undetected by her mother, to take the train to the sea — and she makes it. With a mix of luck and the distraction or poor timing of the adults she encounters, drawing on lessons from her past, she reaches the beach while the sun is still high. She watches the sea, runs barefoot along the shore, chases gulls. We leave her when, after a moment of worry, she pulls her pool card from her backpack—the one with the essential phone numbers written on it, the ones she knows by heart, the ones that will get her safely home.
That's the story, but from the moment Clara makes her decision, we enter her thoughts. We enter the mind of a fourteen-year-old girl with Down syndrome who attended elementary school, who lives in a calm household, who has acquaintances and friends in her neighborhood and at the center she attends.
With her, we experience the wait for the sea, the chance meetings of this particular day, the memories and experiences of her past life.
Clara shows us, above all, her distinctive way of living—the beautiful sensations that make her feel free and happy, the things that trouble her and cause her pain, often precisely because she doesn't fully understand them. And she shares her joy, her capacity to bounce back, the simplicity and honesty in her relationships with others, and all that "range of feelings that, as the author says, certain special people manage to bring into play."
Who is this book for? Not young children, but teenagers in middle school—and an adult should read along. It's for everyone who cares about these "special" young people, who follows their lives, who wants to understand them better. The author, who was an elementary school teacher for many years and is now a successful writer, clearly knows these young people well.
— Tea Cabras, 2000