The Last Apple Tree

Claudia Mills

Jun 2024 · Tantor Media Inc · Narrated by Andrea Emmes and Brian Holden

About this audiobook

Twelve-year-old Sonnet's family has just moved across the country to live with her grandfather after her nana dies. Gramps's once-impressive apple orchard has been razed for a housing development, with only one heirloom tree left. Sonnet doesn't want to think about how Gramps and his tree are both growing old-she just wants everything to be okay. Sonnet is not okay with her neighbor, Zeke, a boy her age who gets on her bad side when he tries to choose her grandpa to interview for an oral history assignment. Zeke irks Sonnet with his prying questions. Meanwhile, Sonnet joins the Green Club at school and without talking to Zeke about it, she asks his activist father to speak at the Arbor Day assembly-a collision of worlds that Zeke wanted more than anything to avoid. But when the interviews uncover a buried tragedy that concerns Sonnet's mother, and an emergency forces Sonnet and Zeke to cooperate again, Sonnet learns not just to accept Zeke as he is, but also that sometimes forgetting isn't the solution-even when remembering seems harder. Award-winning author Claudia Mills brings enormous compassion and depth to this novel of unlikely friendship and generational memory.

About the author

Claudia Mills has written many children's books. She recently received the Kerlan Award for her contribution to children's literature. She was a professor of philosophy for more than two decades at the University of Colorado and is a faculty member in the graduate programs in children's literature at Hollins University.

Audible bestselling, award-winning narrator Andrea Emmes began her career in musical theater and went on to work in TV, film, and video games. Andrea, a total "book nerd," now enjoys narrating audiobooks at her home studio in San Jose, California.

Brian Holden grew up in Traverse City, Michigan, went to college in Ann Arbor, and lived in Los Angeles just long enough to forever hate the winters in Chicago. In addition to running his theater company, StarKid Productions, he performs improv comedy.