From award-winning author Hilary McKay comes a “delightful” illustrated middle grade novel in the spirit of Matilda.
Meet Rosa Mundi: brilliant, curious, and full of quiet wonder. After losing her parents when she was four, Rosa’s life became small—locked away in a bedroom, living under the watch of her distant aunt and uncle who run a business selling plastic grass. Yet through the window drifts a gleaming orange cat named Balthazar, and in the hush of the night Rosa believes in something more: magic, belonging, hope.
When her guardians whisk her off to Venice under the guise of a business trip—only to abandon her in a strange city—Rosa must lean into the very magic she’s held onto all her life. With canals, cats, stars, and a boy in a gondola, Hilary McKay invites us into a luminous middle-grade adventure about courage, home, and the power to find your place in the world—even when you begin alone.
This paperback edition is a heartfelt gift for young readers who believe in hidden wonders.
Format: Paperback
Pages: ~160 pages.
Dimensions: ~5.10ʺ W × 7.50ʺ H.
Weight: estimated ~0.45 lb
Reading Age / Audience: Middle Grade fiction — recommended ages approx. 8-12 years.
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