Anna is not at all happy when she hears that her cousin Tara Myrold and her parents are moving from Cleveland to Cape Cod and renting the beach house where the sea witch Goody Hallett used to live.
“If you talk about things that are secret, Goody Hallett will turn your mouth into stone,” says Anna. Tara presses her lips together and doesn’t reveal her secret. She only wears red T-shirts, because red means “stop.” She gathers cork bottles to send messages to Europe. She draws fish and tells strange stories. When Tara’s mother dies, she sits for days in the dunes and talks to no one.
Until the day when a pod of pilot whales beaches. Tara and Anna experience the entire rescue operation and through the difficulties with the small pilot whale, Baby, Tara begins her story. Through talking, she realizes that her mouth cannot turn into stone.
My Aunt is a Pilot Whale shares, in clear and tangible language, the story of a survivor of child sexual abuse.
The story of the stranding of whales is based on true events. Read a report of the stranding of 1986, with a photo of Baby, Tag en Noch.
English edition
- My aunt is a pilot whale
Toronto: Women's Press, 1994
Translated by Ria Bleumer
ISBN: 0 88961 202 1
Order
Dutch editions
- Mijn tante is een grindewal.
Den Bosch: Malmberg / Van In, Boektoppers, pocket edition, 2003
200 pag.
isbn 90 345 1286X
- Mijn tante is een grindewal.
Antwerpen/Baarn: Houtekiet/Fontein, 1995
159 pag.
Cover: Gert Dooreman en Michiel Hendrickx (foto)
ISBN for the Netherlanda 90 261 0882 6
ISBN: 9789052403281
ISBN: 9052403287 tot 1/1/07
- Mijn tante is een grindewal.
Antwerpen/Baarn: Houtekiet/Fontein, 1990
159 pag.
ISBN: 90 5240 046 6
Polish edition
- Moja ciotka jest delfinem
Gdansk: OficynaJP2, 2006
Translated by Jadwiga Jedryas
ISBN: 83 89857 16 2
Portuguese edition
- A minha tia é uma baleia
Porto: Afrontamento, 2002
Translated by Arie Pos
ISBN: 972 36 0450 7
Norwegian edition
- Strandet
Oslo: Aschehoug, 1992
Translated from Danish to Norwegian by Mette Newth
ISBN: 82 03 16915 5
ISBN (Ungdomsbokklubben): 82 525 1761 7
Swedish edition
- När grindvalar strandar
Stockholm: Opal, 1992
Translated by Ingrid Wiken Bonde & Peter Bolin
ISBN: 91 7270 640 6
German editions
- Tränen sind für die Augen, was der Regenbogen für den Himmel ist
Weinheim: Anrich, 1995
ISBN 3 89106 253 2
- Tränen sind für die Augen, was der Regenbogen für den Himmel ist
Kevelaer: Anrich, 1992
Translated by Siegfried Mrotzek
ISBN: 3 89106 144 7
Danish edition
- Min tante er en grindehval
København: Høst & Søn, 1991
Translated by Birte Carle
ISBN: 87 14 13017 3
