Come a Stranger

Book excerpt: A dashed dream leads to a rash decision in the fifth installment of Cynthia Voigt’s Tillerman cycle. Mina Smiths lives to dance, so her scholarship to ballet camp seems like a dream come true. She doesn’t even mind being the only black girl in the troupe—that is, until she is told she’ll never be a classical dancer. It’s then that Mina begins to face some difficult truths about race and identity and transfers her passion for dance to Tamer Shipp, the summer minister for her church. The problem is, he’s a grown man with a family, but she can’t stop wishing for more to their friendship than simply pastor and parishioner. Cynthia Voigt’s incomparable mastery of character and community shines forth in this stirring novel from her acclaimed Tillerman cycle.