Gossamer

Ms. Lowry now divides her time between Cambridge and an 1840s farmhouse in Maine. To learn more about Lois Lowry, see her website at www.loislowry.com.

is the author of more than thirty books for young adults, including the popular Anastasia Krupnik series. She has received countles

After several years at Brown University, she turned to her family and to writing.

She was born in Hawaii and grew up in New York, Pennsylvania, and Japan.

LOIS LOWRY is known for her versatility and invention as a writer.

She was puzzled and almost frightened at first. Then she thought, Of course! Most Ancient could not always have been Most Ancient, and Thin Elderly must once have been something else. Even Fastidious—well, maybe not. Perhaps she had always been Fastidious.

She cradled New Littlest, moving her hands as gently as possible around the fragile little thing, and turned back to ask Most Ancient what she needed to know.

“Who am I now?”

“Gossamer,” he told her.

Who are you?” she asked the diminutive, transparent creature in her arms, keeping her voice calm and quiet so that it wouldn’t be scared.

“New Littlest,” it told her.

I’ve never been solid before.”

What fills me?” she asked, staring still at her arm.

“Everything that you’re a part of. Your own story fills you.”

“What happens to me now?”

My goodness!” she exclaimed. “I’m not transparent anymore!” She peered at her own arm, then lifted a leg and looked carefully at that as well. “I can’t see through me!