Heidi, with eBook Lib/E

Orphaned at an early age and taken in by her young aunt Dete, Heidi is soon in the way. Dete has a new and better job where Heidi is not welcome, so the child must live with her curmudgeon of a grandfather high on the Alm Mountain in the Swiss Alps. Everyone calls him the Alm-Uncle because he never comes down to the village, even in the coldest winter, and he's developed a reputation as an evil, godless old hermit. But Heidi soon finds that things are not always what others say they are, makes friends with the Alm-Uncle, and happily runs wild in the glorious mountains with the goat boy, Peter, and his goats. Suddenly, Dete appears again, and Heidi finds herself confined in a stone house in a stone city where she is expected to be companion to the invalid Clara. Dete sees this as a great opportunity for Heidi, one that will provide her with an education and polish. But, bitterly unhappy away from her grandfather and the outdoor life she has grown to love, Heidi at last makes her way back to the Alm. How Klara finally comes to the mountains as well, and the surprising events that follow, form the heartwarming ending to a story that has been loved for generations by children all over the world.

About the Author :
Johanna Spyri (1827-1901) was an author of children's stories and is best known for writing Heidi. Born Johanna Louise Heusser in the rural area of Hirzel, Switzerland, as a child she spent several summers in the area around Chur in Graubunden, the setting she would later use in her novels. In 1852, Johanna married Bernhard Spyri, a lawyer. While living in Zurich, she began to write about life in the country. Her first book, A Leaf on Vrony's Grave, was published in 1871, and the following year further stories by Spyri--for both adults and children--appeared, among them the tale of Heidi that became an instant and enduring success. Heidi, the story of an orphan girl who lives with her grandfather in the Alps, is famous not only for its vivid portrayal of the landscape but also for its understanding of how children see life and experience their feelings. Johanna's husband and her only child, a son named Bernhard, both died in 1884. Alone, she devoted herself to charitable causes and wrote over fifty more stories before her death in 1901. An icon in Switzerland, Johanna's portrait was placed on a postage stamp in 1951 and on a twenty-CHF (Swiss franc) commemorative coin in 2001. Frances Cassidy is an audiobook narrator whose readings include David Baldacci's The Winner, Michael Crichton's Airframe, and Hellen Keller's The Story of My Life, among others.