“Turtle in Paradise” is a sweet, gentle historical fiction about the Florida Keys in 1935, when you had to take a boat to get there.

    Critics praised the sand-in-your-shoes, pick-fruit-off-the-trees, pirate-treasure-around-the-corner feelings of this book written by Jennifer L. Holm.

    Turtle is a tough* girl who knows life is not like the movies, even though her Pollyanna single mother always sees the sunny side.

    When Turtle’s mother sends her to stay in Key West with family while her mother works as a housekeeper* in New Jersey, Turtle resents being sent away and is prepared to hate her mother’s hometown and everyone in it.

    So her growing fondness for her aunt, her neighbors, and even her smart-mouthed* cousin Beans takes Turtle by surprise. By the time her mother comes to Key West to fetch her, Turtle has found a home she is not sure she wants to leave.

    There are some nice plot features. Relatives crop up in unexpected places. There are a bad guy or two, a hurricane*, and even hidden treasure.

    Read it as part of a historical fiction or realistic* fiction genre study. It may take a little prodding*.(SD-Agencies)