"Hazel and Jack are best friends until an accident with a magical mirror and a run-in with a villainous queen find Hazel on her own, entering an enchanted wood in the hopes of saving Jack's life" -- Provided by publisher. - (Baker & Taylor)

Hazel and Jack are best friends until an accident with a magical mirror and a run-in with a villainous queen find Hazel on her own, entering an enchanted wood in the hopes of saving Jack's life. - (Baker & Taylor)

Hazel and Jack are best friends until an accident with a magical mirror and a run-in with a villainous queen find Hazel on her own, entering an enchanted wood in the hope of saving Jack's life. 25,000 first printing. - (Baker & Taylor)

"Hazel and Jack are best friends until an accident with a magical mirror and a run-in with a villainous queen find Hazel on her own, entering an enchanted wood in the hopes of saving Jack's life " -- Provided by publisher. - (Baker & Taylor)

The winner of numerous awards and recipient of four starred reviews, Anne Ursu's Breadcrumbs is a stunning and heartbreaking story of growing up, wrapped in a modern-day fairy tale.

Once upon a time, Hazel and Jack were best friends. But that was before he stopped talking to her and disappeared into a forest with a mysterious woman made of ice. Now it's up to Hazel to go in after him. Inspired by Hans Christian Andersen's "The Snow Queen," Breadcrumbs is a stunningly original fairy tale of modern-day America, a dazzling ode to the power of fantasy, and a heartbreaking meditation on how growing up is as much a choice as it is something that happens to us.

In Breadcrumbs, Anne Ursu tells, in her one-of-a-kind voice, a story that brings together fifty years of children's literature in a tale as modern as it is timeless. Hazel's journey to come to terms with her evolving friendship with Jack will deeply resonate with young readers.

Supports the Common Core State Standards

The winner of numerous awards and recipient of four starred reviews, Anne Ursu's Breadcrumbs is a stunning and heartbreaking story of growing up, wrapped in a modern-day fairy tale.

Once upon a time, Hazel and Jack were best friends. But that was before he stopped talking to her and disappeared into a forest with a mysterious woman made of ice. Now it's up to Hazel to go in after him. Inspired by Hans Christian Andersen's "The Snow Queen," Breadcrumbs is a stunningly original fairy tale of modern-day America, a dazzling ode to the power of fantasy, and a heartbreaking meditation on how growing up is as much a choice as it is something that happens to us.

In Breadcrumbs, Anne Ursu tells, in her one-of-a-kind voice, a story that brings together fifty years of children's literature in a tale as modern as it is timeless. Hazel's journey to come to terms with her evolving friendship with Jack will deeply resonate with young readers.

Supports the Common Core State Standards

A stunning modern-day fairy tale from acclaimed author Anne Ursu

Once upon a time, Hazel and Jack were best friends. But that was before he stopped talking to her and disappeared into a forest with a mysterious woman made of ice. Now it's up to Hazel to go in after him. Inspired by Hans Christian Andersen's "The Snow Queen," Breadcrumbs is a story of the struggle to hold on, and the things we leave behind.

Booklist Reviews

Hazel, a fifth-grader who lives with her divorced mother, isn't adjusting well to her new school. Worse, her one dependable friendship, with her next-door-neighbor Jack, has become unstable. When glass falls from the sky and into Jack's eye, its source is a mystery, but readers are told that a shard of magic mirror, shattered by a goblin high above the earth, caused the injury. Soon afterward, a white witch lures him to a frozen pond, where he lives while Hazel braves the terrors of the magic woods to rescue him. Mixing realistic and fantastic realms is a chancy endeavor, but Ursu draws readers into lonely Hazel's world and makes her quest a compelling story. Throughout the text are allusions to fairy tales, principally Andersen's "The Snow Queen," as well as classic and contemporary children's books. These allusions will enrich the narrative in proportion to the reader's knowledge of the originals. This fantasy features polished prose, a carefully crafted story, and a hauntingly beautiful dust jacket. Copyright 2011 Booklist Reviews.

Horn Book Guide Reviews

In Ursu s riff on The Snow Queen, Hazel is demoralized when her friend Jack refuses to have anything to do with her, instead playing with his male schoolmates. Then he disappears altogether. But fantasy-reading Hazel knows a fairy tale when she sees one: she heads into the woods and successfully negotiates the duplicitous characters she meets. Ursu s prose is pungent, humorous, and vivid.

Horn Book Magazine Reviews

In Ursu's riff on Hans Christian Andersen's The Snow Queen, Hazel, already unhappy in school, is demoralized further when her good friend Jack suddenly refuses to have anything to do with her and, instead, plays with his male schoolmates. Then he disappears altogether, without warning. But Hazel knows a fairy tale when she sees one: she heads into the woods, successfully negotiates the duplicitous characters she meets there, and wins Jack from the Snow Queen by reminding him of their shared past. Hazel's perceptiveness, Ursu suggests, comes from her love of reading fantasy; indeed, Ursu alludes explicitly to The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe; The Golden Compass; The Wizard of Oz; A Wrinkle in Time; When You Reach Me; "The Little Match Girl"; Coraline; and the Harry Potter books, among others. For those who aren't already fantasy readers, such allusions may pose an impenetrable code; for those who are, the references shed an unflattering light on Ursu's less logically and imaginatively coherent fantasy. Which is not to say that Ursu is without her strengths: her prose, although sometimes overwrought, is more often pungent, humorous, and vivid ("Hazel's mom drove their car like it was an emotionally unstable bear"). Her potent evocation of midwinter Minneapolis is memorable; so, too, is her evocation of that moment when you realize a dear friend may have outgrown you. deirdre f. baker

Kirkus Reviews

In this contemporary version of The Snow Queen, fifth-grader Hazel embarks on a memorable journey into the Minnesota woods to find her best friend Jack, who vanishes after a shard of glass pierces his eye.

Adopted from India as a baby, fantasy maven Hazel has always felt "she was from a different planet." Hazel tries "desperately not to disturb the universe" at Lovelace Elementary, where she doesn't fit in with anyone except Jack, the only person she knows with a real imagination. Together they've grown out of "Wonderland Arctic space-people tea parties" into "superhero baseball"—until the day Hazel pelts Jack with a snowball, glass enters his eye and he disappears with a mysterious woman resembling the Snow Queen. Uncertain if Jack's really changed or something fey's afoot, Hazel enters the woods to find "an entirely different place," populated by creatures from the pages of Hans Christian Andersen. As Hazel discovers she doesn't know the ground rules, the third-person narrator engages readers with asides and inter-textual references from the fairy-tale canon. And like a fairy-tale heroine, Hazel traverses the woods without a breadcrumb trail to save a boy who may not want to be saved in this multi-layered, artfully crafted, transforming testament to the power of friendship.

Publishers Weekly Reviews

Ursu follows her Cronus Chronicles trilogy with this deeply felt, modern-day fantasy that borrows plot from Hans Christian Andersen's The Snow Queen. Richly imaginative fifth-grader Hazel, adopted from India, has recently switched schools and is failing (badly) to fit in. Money is tight, her parents have divorced, and her best friend, Jack, suddenly rebuffs her. Hazel is devastated, but readers learn the cause of Jack's alienation is a shard of magical mirror lodged in his heart. When Jack disappears with an ethereal woman on a sled pulled by wolves, Hazel heads into the wintry and enchanted Minnesota woods to rescue him. A sadness as heavy as a Northwoods snowfall pervades this story, though it has its delights, too. Ursu offers many winks at avid fans of fairy tales and fantasy (Jack's mother looks "like someone had severed her daemon"). The creepy fantasyland that Hazel traverses uses bits from other Andersen tales to create a story that, though melancholy, is beautifully written and wholly original. It's certainly the only children's fantasy around where Minnesota Twins All-Star catcher Joe Mauer figures into the plot. Final art not seen by PW. Ages 8–12. (Oct.)

School Library Journal Reviews

Gr 5–8—Hazel Anderson's 10-year-old world is teetering on the unsteady foundation of her parents' separation, as she is now at a new school where she feels like an outsider, both as a dreamer and as an adoptee from South Asia. She is bullied and misunderstood, and her best friend, Jack, is spending more time with his male friends than with her. When a demon drops a shard of an enchanted mirror into his eye and he becomes drugged and manic under its influence, he accompanies the Snow Queen into the woods. During her search for him, Hazel's realistic world collides with surreal fantasy and she is thrown into the eerie, threatening woods of broken and transformed fairy tales. She encounters shadowy threats in the form of creepy, unscrupulous adults who have their own agendas and victims: a girl ensnared in the body of a bird, and children trapped as flowers. Hazel's challenge consists largely in persisting in her quest to rescue Jack despite her insecurity about their friendship and the lack of a breadcrumb path in a confusing world. Unlike the triumphant ending of Andersen's "Snow Queen," Hazel's rescue of Jack and its aftermath is realistically bittersweet. Jack is who he is, a boy who is growing away from her. It is Hazel who is changed by her experience, and who learns to approach her life with positive energy. Although this is a fantasy, its grounding in psychological realism and focus on Hazel's feelings makes it a fine choice for readers who prefer realistic fiction. Ursu's multilayered, dreamlike story stands out from the fantasy/quest pack.—Sue Giffard, Ethical Culture Fieldston School, New York City