Publisher: Luath Press Ltd

Gussie is a twelve year old girl from St. Ives in Cornwall. She is passionate about learning, wildlife, poetry, literature, and she wants to be a photographer when she grows up. But her dreams were put on hold as she struggled with a serious heart condition. Now she has got what she needed: a heart and lung transplant. But it isn't working out quite the way she thought. Firstly she has to leave her beloved Cornwall to live in London and in the months following her operation she is unable to do very much except read and adopt a stray kitten, but she could do that when she was sick. She craves adventure and experience beyond her four walls, until, that is, she hits upon a plan - she is going to get her divorced parents to fall in love again. It's not going to be easy, her mum is still dating her doctor boyfriend and despises Gussie's father, who happens to be living with his new girlfriend - the Snow Queen. But Gussie is a determined girl and there is only one thing that could stop her now.

REVIEWS
'Not many books around that you can give to anyone of any age and be sure of an appreciative audience, but Kelley does it beautifully in this, the third in the Gussie series, following the well-deserved Costa Category award for The Bower Bird.'
SUE BAKER's Personal Choice, PUBLISHING NEWS

'A great book.'
THE INDEPENDENT

'You have to read it, and it will stay with you forever!'
TEEN TITLES

BACK COVER
I ask for a mirror. My chest is covered in wide tape, so I can't see the clips or incision but I want to see my face, to see if i've changed.

Gussie wants to go to school like every other teenage girl and find out what it's like to kiss a boy. But she's just had a heart and lung transplant and she's staying in London to recover from the operation.

Between managing her parents' love lives, waiting for her breasts to finally start growing, and trying to hide a destructive kitten in her dad's expensive bachelor pad, Gussie makes friends with another cardio pation int the hospital, and finds out that she can't have everything her heart desires...

About Ann Kelley

Ann Kelley is a photographer and prize-winning poet who once nearly played cricket for Cornwall. She has previously published a collection of poems and photographs, a book of photos of St. Ives families and an audio book of cat stories. She lives with her second husband and several cats on the edge of a cliff in Cornwall where they have survived a flood, a landslip, a lightning strike and the roof blowing off. She runs courses for aspiring poets at her home, writing courses for medics and medical students, and speaks about her poetry therapy work with patients at medical conferences.