Book excerpt: Shortlisted for the Sheila A. Egoff Children's Literature Prize, the CLA Book of the Year for Children Award, and selected as an OLA Best Bet for 2012 a poignant and gently funny middle - grade novel about two maybe orphans and their unlikely friendship with a cranky old neighbor. Set in Vancouver and the B.C. wilderness, this is a book that reflects Caroline Adderson's many writerly strengths - her ''wit and a facility for dialogue, good pacing and a brisk, clean prose style'' ("Globe and Mail"), her ''close observation of telling details'' ("Quill & Quire") and her ability to ''celebrate a child's imagination in a realistically humorous way'' ("Canadian Materials").