Summary

Chapter 1

Eleven year-old Galadriel “Gilly” Hopkins has a meeting with her social worker, Miss Ellis. Miss Ellis informs Gilly that she needs to make an effort because her new home will be her third foster home in three years. Miss Ellis is emotional and wants to make sure Gilly is placed in a good home, but Gilly is bored with Miss Ellis. Miss Ellis explains that the new foster family, the Trotters, will be unlike the others. Gilly is notorious across America as being a problem child with whom few wish to tangle. Miss Ellis and Gilly arrive at the Trotters’ house, a big old home in an old neighborhood in Thompson Park, Maryland. Maime Trotter, the matriarch of the family, comes out to meet them.

Gilly is brought inside where she meets her new brother, William Earnest Teague, a small boy. Everything...