Each Little Bird That Sings
by Deborah Wiles

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2005 National Book Award finalist
Golden Kite Honor Book
Bank Street Fiction Award
E.B. White Read-Aloud Award
(state master lists, below)

hear an excerpt at Listening Library

Scholastic Literature Circle Guide

Read Comfort's Top Ten Tips for First-Rate Funeral Behavior

"A fresh voice and an honest portrayal of life and death are a match made in heaven... a memorable tribute to the joys of living." —Starred review, Kirkus

"The family takes on joyous dimensionality through Comfort's first-person narration, her memories and comments highlighting each person's quirkiness and tenderness." -- Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books

"Comfort grabs on to the reader's heart and refuses to let it go." -- Bookpage

"This is a deeply felt novel." -- School Library Journal

"Debbie, we are just so proud of you." -- Aunt Beth

"What about me?" -- Ruby Lavender

From Chapter One:

I come from a family with a lot of dead people.

Great-uncle Edisto keeled over with a stroke on a Saturday morning after breakfast last March. Six months later, Great-great Aunt Florentine died -- just like that -- in the vegetable garden. And, of course, there are all the dead people who lay temporarily downstairs until they go off to the Snapfinger Cemetery. I'm related to them, too. Uncle Edisto always said, "Everybody's kin, Comfort."

Downstairs at Snowberger's my Daddy deals with death by misadventure, illness, and natural causes galore. Sometimes I ask him how somebody died. He tells me, then he says, "It's not how you die that makes the important impression, Comfort; it's how you live. Now go live a while, honey, and let me get back to work." But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let me back up. I'll start with Great-uncle Edisto and last March, since that death involves me -- I witnessed it.

Comfort Snowberger has attended 247 funerals. That’s a lot for a ten-year-old. But if your family runs the town funeral home and their motto is “We Live to Serve,” then that’s what you do. Yes, it’s sad when Great-Great Aunt Florentine drops dead—just like that in the vegetable garden —but Comfort knows how to handle loss. What she can’t handle is her crazy cousin Peach, who ruins every family occasion, and her best friend, Declaration, who suddenly won’t speak to her. Aunt Florentine’s funeral will be a time to remember. But all Comfort really wants to do is sit in her closet with her dog, Dismay, and hide.

Life is full of surprises. And the biggest one of all is learning what it takes to handle them.

Publisher: Harcourt Brace. Cover Art by the amazing Marla Frazee

More honors for LITTLE BIRD:

Booksense Top-Ten Pick
Borders Bookstores "Original Voice"
Junior Library Guild selection
IRA-CBC Children's Choice

Arizona Young Reader Award Master List
Indiana Young Hoosiers Master List
Iowa Choice Master List
Virginia Readers' Choice List
Texas Bluebonnet Master List
Vermont Dorothy Canfield Fisher Master List
Tennessee Volunteer Master List
Maine Student Book Award Master List
Rhode Island Student Book Award Master List
Kansas -- William Allen White Student Book Award Master List
Alabama Emphasis on Reading Student Book Award Master List
Delaware Blue Hen Book Award Master List
New Hampshire Cochecho Reader's Award Nominee
New Hampshire Great Stone Face Award Master List
Kentucky Bluegrass Award Nominee
Kentucky Rebecca Caudill Award Nominee
Hawaii Nene Award Master List
California Young Reader Medal Master List