Shiva's Fire

By the Newbery Honor-winning author of Shabanu

On a day when fish leap among the stars and birds soar beneath the waters, a remarkable girl named Parvati is born in a village in the South of India. As she grows, she becomes known for the peculiar events that seem to spring from beneath her dancing feet, and is widely thought to have supernatural powers. When a great master of Indian classical dance comes to see for himself, he recognizes in Parvati a rare talent and invites her to study with him at his gurukulam in the city of Madras. There she commits herself to a rigorous and solitary program of study, dance, and devotion. But when she meets a boy with his own extraordinary powers, her life is turned upside down, and she must question the one thing of which she has always been most sure - that she was born to dance. In this powerful novel rich with mysticism, Suzanne Fisher Staples tells the poignant story of a strong girl who refuses to squander her magical gifts in the face of life's ordinary but perplexing mysteries.