Steve is also author of a short story collection, My Chaos Theory (2006, Southern Methodist University Press), which was a finalist for the Paterson Fiction Prize, and an Honorable Mention for the Library of Virginia Fiction Award. Another young adult novel, Goat Girl, is scheduled for publication by Candlewick Press in spring 2011. Steve Watkins is the author of Down Sand Mountain, a young adult novel published in October 2008 by Candlewick Press. Powerful and deeply moving, this compelling novel affirms the redemptive power of animals and the resilience of the human spirit. Sent to live with an offbeat foster family and their 'dooking' ferrets, Iris must find a way to take care of the animals back at the farm, even if it means confronting Aunt Sue. Things come to a head when Iris sets two young goats free to save them from slaughter, and an enraged Aunt Sue orders her brutish son, Book, to beat Iris senseless - a horrific act that lands Book and his mother in jail.

Iris, a vegetarian and animal lover, immediately clashes with Aunt Sue, who mistreats the livestock, spends Iris’s small inheritance, and thinks nothing of striking Iris for the smallest offense. A gripping portrait of a teen’s struggles through grief and abuse - and the miraculous power of animals to heal us.Īfter her veterinarian dad dies, sixteen-year-old Iris Wight must leave her beloved Maine to live on a North Carolina farm with her hardbitten aunt and a cousin she barely knows.

What comes after by steve watkins