Mira’s Diary: California Dreaming

April 2016

In the last book of the time-travel series, Mira explores the past of her familiar Bay Area, discovering layers of history in San Francisco and learning the real reason her mother has been working to change history. On the way, she meets Mark Twain and uncovers the Watcher’s real identity.

Fourteen–year old Mira wraps up her time travels and lots of loose ends in this the fourth book in her diary series. After ancient Rome, 19th–century Paris and World War I London, she returns home to the Bay Area with her brother and dad. Mom is MIA, probably in San Francisco, sometime in the past, trying to change things for the better. In hot pursuit, Mira uses Touchstones to reach 1896, 1906, and 1934. Along the way, she meets Samuel Clemens and Ina Coolbrith and sees life for early Jewish and Chinese immigrants. Girded with historical detail, the plot moves quickly toward revelations about what Mom’s been doing and why. Add in a terrorist twist, philosophical musings and social commentary. (Censorship in academia takes in on the chin.) The result is a page–turner that extols freedom of speech. —Susan Faust, San Francisco Chronicle