Georgia's Greatness
Read Georgia's Greatness Online
Authors: Lauren Baratz-Logsted
The Sisters 8
BOOK 3
Georgia's Greatness
By Lauren Baratz-Logsted
With Greg Logsted & Jackie Logsted
Illustrated by Lisa K. Weber
Table of Contents
Sandpiper
H
OUGHTON
M
IFFLIN
H
ARCOURT
B
OSTON
2009
Text copyright © 2009 by Lauren Baratz-Logsted
Illustrations copyright © 2009 by Lisa K. Weber
All rights reserved. For information about permission to
reproduce selections from this book, write to Permissions,
Houghton Mifflin Company, 215 Park Avenue South,
New York, New York 10003.
SANDPIPER and the SANDPIPER logo are trademarks of the
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
The text of this book is set in Youbee.
Book design by Carol Chu.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Baratz-Logsted, Lauren.
Georgia's greatness / by Lauren Baratz-Logsted ; with Greg Logsted
and Jackie Logsted.
p. cm. — (The sisters eight ; bk. 3)
Summary: As the Huit octuplets prepare for a St. Patrick's Day parade,
Georgia discovers her powers and uncovers the substitute teacher's secret.
ISBN 978-0-547-16699-5 (hardcover) — ISBN 978-0-547-05340-0 (pbk.)
[1. Sisters—Fiction. 2. Abandoned children—Fiction. 3. Schools—Fiction. 4.
Substitute teachers—Fiction. 5. Saint Patrick's Day—Fiction.] I. Logsted, Greg.
II. Logsted, Jackie. III. Title.
PZ7.B22966Ge 2009
[Fic]—dc22
2008043167
Printed in the United States of America
MP 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
For Laura Wininger and Jeffrey Isaac
If not for your hospitality when
we were snowbound in colorado,
the Sisters Eight would never have
been born. Thank you for a Lifetime
of Love and friendship.
Annie Durinda Georgia Jackie
Marcia Petal Rebecca Zinnia
PROLOGUE
Are you still here?
Or did you just walk in?
Very well...
Once upon a time there were eight sisters who would all one day be eight years old. At the same time. You know: octuplets.
Their names were Annie, Durinda, Georgia, Jackie, Marcia, Petal, Rebecca, and Zinnia. They were each born a minute apart on August 8, 2000. All eight had brown hair and brown eyes. And although they were all the same exact age, give or take a few minutes, each was one inch taller than the next, with Zinnia being the shortest and Annie the tallest.
On New Year's Eve 2007, their parents disappeared, or died. Their mother went into the kitchen for eggnog, their father went out to the woodshed for firewood, and neither returned.
Now the Eights must figure out what happened to their parents while keeping the outside world from discovering that eight little girls are home alone.
At the beginning of their first adventure, also known as
The Sisters Eight, Book 1: Annie's Adventures,
the girls became aware of the disappearance of their parents, and they found a note hidden behind a loose stone in the wall of the drawing room of their magnificent home. The note read:
Dear Annie, Durinda, Georgia, Jackie, Marcia, Petal, Rebecca, and Zinnia,
This may come as rather a shock to you, but it appears you each possess a power and a gift. The powers you already have—you merely don't know you have them yet. The gifts are from your parents, and these you must also discover for yourselves. In fact, you must each discover both your power and your gift in order to reveal what happened to your parents. Have you got all that?
The note was unsigned.
During the course of
Book 1: Annie's Adventures,
Annie discovered her power: the ability to be as smart as an adult when needed. She also discovered her gift: a lovely ring with a purple gemstone in it.
Then, in
Book 2: Durinda's Dangers,
Durinda discovered
her
power: by tapping her leg three times rapidly and then pointing at a person, she could make that person freeze. Except Zinnia, of course. No matter what anyone did, no one could make Zinnia freeze. And Durinda also discovered
her
gift: beautiful earrings the color of emeralds.
By the end of the second book, the Eights, as they are known, realized there was a pattern to the madness: each month one of them, starting with the oldest and working down, would discover her own power and gift. Annie discovered hers in January, and Durinda discovered hers in February. This meant that in March, it would be Georgia's turn.
Oh, dear.
Oh, deary dear.
And one final
oh, dear:
Have you noticed something odd? Is a book
talking
to you? Well, I suppose it's better than your
refrigerator
doing the talking...
And what
did
happen to the Eights' parents? Well, we don't know that yet, do we? Besides, if I told you that now, I would be
telling
and not
showing...
CHAPTER ONE
"It was a dark and stormy night," Rebecca said.
It was that. It was also the first of March, a Saturday.
"I believe that line has been used before," Jackie pointed out to Rebecca.
Jackie read more books than any of us. Some of us thought she read
too
much. But whenever any of us tried to mention that, she told us that such a thing was impossible.
We were all in the front room, looking out the window, watching the rain pour down. Daddy Sparky, the suit of armor we dressed up so nosy people peeking in would think our real daddy was there, sat in his usual chair, the big comfy one. Mommy Sally, the dressmaker's dummy we dressed up to look like our real mommy, was standing at his side, wearing a sleeveless purple dress and a string of pearls. Daddy Sparky and Mommy Sally weren't much good at conversation, but at least they provided
some
adult company. Plus, they were both smart dressers.
"It was raining cats and dogs," Annie said, thinking to improve on Rebecca's opening line. That was Annie all over: always trying to one-up the rest of us.
"I think that would be very scary for the cats," Petal said. "In fact, I know Precious wouldn't want to be part of a downpour."
We had eight gray-and-white puffballs that were our cats, one for each sister. Their names were Anthrax, Dandruff, Greatorex, Jaguar, Minx, Precious, Rambunctious, and Zither. Precious was Petal's cat.
Well, we sighed, at least Petal was worrying about someone other than herself for a change, even if that someone was a cat.
"March is coming in like a lion," Durinda began.
"But are you completely sure it will go out like a lamb?" Zinnia asked.
"If this were April," Marcia observed, "we could have showers that would bring May flowers."
"Would you all just
stop?
" Georgia shouted.
"Did we say something wrong?" Jackie asked.
Georgia continued to stare out into the dark and stormy night as the rain machine-gunned our windows.
"Why does
my
month have to be riddled with clichés?" Georgia finally whined.
"What's a cliché?" Petal wanted to know.
Not only did Petal worry more than any person who ever lived, she also didn't pay attention during vocabulary lessons at the Whistle Stop, the school where we were all third-graders. We tried to tell her that vocabulary was important, but she always told
us
that to
her
it was all just so many words, words, words.
"A cliché," Annie said, as though she were reciting from a dictionary, "is a trite phrase or expression. Also, a hackneyed theme, characterization, or situation."
"Great." Rebecca sneered. "And what do
trite
and
hackneyed
mean? Don't even bother defining
characterization.
I'm sure it doesn't concern us."
"
Trite,
" Annie said, "is when something becomes hackneyed or boring from too much use. It means not fresh, not original.
Hackneyed
means lacking in freshness or originality. Also, it means trite."
"Trite is hackneyed, hackneyed is trite." Rebecca rolled her eyes. "Well,
that
clears it all up. Why can't the people who write dictionaries just agree on one word for it?"
"Exactly," Georgia said. "And that one word should be
cliché.
" She sulked some more, pressing her nose against the glass. "I don't know why
my
month has to be riddled with—"
C-RASH!
S-LAM!
THUMP!
Yes, that was when the carrier pigeon struck the other side of the windowpane that Georgia's nose was pressed against. The carrier pigeon's little body struck the glass with more force than ... well, than any carrier pigeon's body had ever thumped against glass before.
We were used to carrier pigeons visiting the house and bringing notes. They were Daddy's friends. And even now that he was gone, wherever he'd gone to, they still came. But they'd never before come in the midst of a dark and stormy night.
"Well, let it in. Let it in!" Durinda cried, pushing Georgia out of the way and opening the window for the pigeon.
The pigeon, looking about as grateful as we'd ever seen a pigeon look, hopped onto Durinda's outstretched finger.
"Poor little pigeon," Durinda cooed. "All your feathers are soaked."
Just as Annie performed a lot of the daddy functions around the household in the absence of our real daddy, Durinda had turned out to be the most motherly. And we had grown used to things being that way. Really, Daddy Sparky and Mommy Sally might have been sharp dressers, but there was nothing like having real human beings to tuck you in at night, to show you love when you needed it.
"There, there." Durinda continued to soothe the pigeon, using her other hand to stroke its sopping feathers. Then a puzzled look came over Durinda's face. "Hey," she said, "what's this strapped under your wing?"
"It's probably just another one of those stupid notes," Georgia grumped.