Moon Over Manifest Book Review

Moon Over Manifest is a Newbery Medal Winner novel by Clare Vanderpool. 

Twelve-year-old Abilene Tucker feels abandon whenever her father, Gideon, sends her to live with an old friend of his while he works a railway job. The only positive thing Abilene can see is that she will be living in Manifest, the town in which Gideon spent two of his childhood years.  

Having been told stories of Manifest all her life, Abilene is disappointed to find it a dusty, run-down, old town with no trace of her daddy ever having been there. Deciding to set out to find some trace of Gideon, Abilene stumbles upon a box full of mementos and letters that mention a spy known as The Rattler. 

With her new friends Lettie and Ruthanne, Abilene sets out on a spy hunt, despite the anonymous note telling them to “Leave Well Enough Alone.” 

She throws all caution to the wind, however, when she sets off down the Path to Perdition in order to get her lost compass back from the reclusive Miss Sadie, a diviner who only tells stories from the past, and from the point of view of a boy named Jinx… 

Moon Over Manifest is a beautifully written story of friendship, faith, and finding true family. 

My Recommended Age Range: 13+

My Rating: 5/5

Amazon's Rating: 4.5/5

My Favorite Characters: Abilene, Jinx, Ned, Miss Sadie, and Shady Howard

My Favorite Line From The Book: “I thought I knew a thing or two about people. Even had my list of universals. But I wondered. Maybe the world wasn’t made of universals that could be summed up in neat little packages. Maybe there were just people. People who were tired and hurt and lonely and kind in their own way and their own time.”

~ Page 144