Summer of the Gypsy Moths

Summer of the Gypsy Moths (2012), a young adult novel by American author Sara Pennypacker, follows two teenage girls—eleven-year-old Stella and twelve-year-old Angel—as they attempt to cover up the death of Stella’s great-aunt Louise in order to avoid foster care. At the center of the book is the development of Stella and Angel’s relationship: as different as “oil and water,” the girls don’t get along, but as they work together to conceal Louise’s death, they learn to appreciate one another’s gifts. Summer of the Gypsy Moths is the first longer young adult novel from Pennypacker, best known as the author of the Clementine series for younger readers.

Stella lives with her great-aunt Louise, who managers the Linger Longer Cottage Colony on Cape Cod. Stella is the happiest she has been in a long time. She has a troubled relationship with her mother, who abandons her for long stretches at a time. Stella is beginning to put down roots for the first time in her life.

The only niggle in Stella’s situation is Angel, Louise’s foster-daughter. Angel is twelve, and where Stella is a reserved neat-freak, Angel is untidy and passionate. Stella loves reading the “Hints from Heloise” column in Good Housekeeping: Angel loves listening to melancholic fado ballads from Portugal. Even worse, Angel is prickly and offhand with Stella. Stella is rude to Angel in response, and before long, the girls are barely on speaking terms.



Until, that is, Aunt Louise—advanced in years—suddenly dies. With Louise gone, both girls have the same worry. Angel will be returned to the care system, where she might end up in a much worse foster-family. Stella might be sent to another relative, or she might end up in care too. In any case, she doesn’t want to leave Cape Cod, where she is finally feeling at home.

So the girls agree on a plan: they will bury Louise in the backyard and attempt to conceal her death from the authorities. They figure that Stella’s mom will inherit the Cottage Colony: all they have to do is hang on until she swings by to check on Stella. Then she can report Louise’s death and they can all stay where they are. Stella isn’t sure where her mom is right now: maybe California or Mexico.

The girls manage to bury the body without anyone spotting them, but it is only the beginning of their troubles. Before long, George Nickerson, who helps Louise run the Cottages, comes round asking where she is. The first time, the girls say she is sick, but soon this excuse gets tired. They tell George that she has broken her foot, and then that she is on a date with her boyfriend. George asks why there is a new mound of earth in the garden. The girls tell him they are growing pumpkins.



Meanwhile, Stella and Angel can’t agree on anything except the need to keep their secret. Neither of them can cook, so they survive by eating relish, old croutons, and the dust from packets of Froot Loops. One day, Stella finishes her dinner of canned soup and looks out into the yard of the cottage next door. The family there is grilling burgers: “An emptiness welled up inside me. It felt like hunger, but it wasn’t in my stomach.”

The girls also have to take over Louise’s duties as the manager of the Cottages. They set up a babysitting service for the guests, and desperately try to save Louise’s blueberry bushes (planted, long ago, by Stella’s mom) from a gypsy moth infestation. “Hints from Heloise” comes to the rescue here, as Stella remembers how to use old pantyhose and Crisco to combat the caterpillars. The girls begin to have fun, and they grow to respect one another.

Meanwhile, Stella is getting to know George. One day, as they clean out Tern Cottage together, George shows Stella a broken sand dollar. He points out that the pieces inside look like doves: “Now, I see a broken shell and I remind myself that something might have needed setting free. See, broken things always have a story, don’t they?”



Keeping their secret also teaches the girls an important lesson. Realizing that the other teenagers on the beach could never guess her secret, Stella understands that anyone and everyone could have a secret, and she wouldn’t be able to guess it either: “I sank into the warm sand, smiling at the idea of a beach full of people, tied together by their secret-hiding.”

As the blueberries ripen, the situation reaches a crisis point. Louise’s death is discovered, and Stella learns that her mom won’t inherit the Cottages, because Louise didn’t own them. George does. However, the girls have grown so close to George that after he has helped them escape the fall-out from their decision to hide Louise’s death, he adopts them.