Straight from the mouth of Anne Turner Coppola, author of Fly Away Free

Inside the Book:

Title: Fly Away Free 

Author: Anne Turner Coppola 

Publisher: Xlibris 

Genre: Juvenile Fiction 

Format: Ebook

The story begins when Tessie Farrell, an older woman living in South Florida, is walking her dog and rescues a baby osprey whose parents are killed by three young boys raiding the osprey’s nest to steal the baby ospreys. Taking the rescued baby osprey home, Tessie contacts the police to report what happened. After caring and feeding the baby osprey and building a cage for the bird, Tessie finds herself exhausted. Lying down to rest, Tessie is transported back in time, when she was a ten-year-old girl living with her parents on a dairy farm in northern New York. Devastated to learn that she is adopted, Tessie is taunted by her classmates as she struggles to understand why she was unwanted by her biological parents. In her isolation from children her own age, she creates her own fantasy world with the help of Dolly, a horse that is boarded at the farm and whom Tessie adopts as her pet horse, and two pet geese, raised and nurtured by Tessie as hatchlings. While Tessie roams her fantasy world with Dolly, she meets and befriends an older woman, Maudie, who will play a very important role in helping Tessie find herself as she learns to accept who she is and to find acceptance by those around her. This is a story of courage, self-discovery, and love, and a young girl’s struggle to overcome the pain of being adopted.

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Tessie Farrell, an older woman living in south Florida is walking her dog near Miami Beach when she comes across three young boys who have taken the newly-hatched ospreys from their nest. Confronting the boys, the two on the ground flee, and the third flees when the osprey nest falls to the ground, forcing the nesting baby osprey to attempt to fly, landing in the bay. Tessie rescues the baby osprey and finds the osprey parents, who have been killed by the young boys who raided the osprey’s nest to steal the recently hatched babies. Having had some experience caring for birds in her youth, Tessie takes the baby osprey home, and calls the police to report what happened. After caring and feeding the bird, and building a cage for the osprey, Tessie finds herself exhausted and needing to rest. Lying down on the porch sofa, sleep soon overtakes her, and she is transported back in time, when she was a ten-year old girl growing up on her parents’ dairy farm in northern New York, on the St. Lawrence River.

            Devastated to learn that she is adopted, Tessie is taunted by her classmates as she struggles to understand why she was unwanted by her biological parents. In her isolation from children her own age. Tessie creates her own fantasy world with the help of Dolly, a horse that is boarded at her parent’s farm and whom Tessie adopts as her pet, and two geese, raised and nurtured by Tessie from hatchlings. While roaming her fantasy world with Dolly, she meets and befriends an older woman, Maudie Carroll, the local high school librarian, who plays an important role in helping Tessie as find herself she learns to accept who she is, and to find acceptance by those around her. This is a story of courage and determination, self-discovery and love, and a young girl’s struggle to overcome the pain of being an adopted child.

Question2 – Who or what is the inspiration behind this book?

Anne was a teacher who taught children at all levels of learning- elementary, midlle and high schoolers. She loved her students, particularly her elementary kids. I believe she had these stories germinating  for some time, and only needed the the right opportunity to begin. That opportunity, I believe, came when she retired and had the time to sit down and write.. I also believe that Fly Away Free was close to being autobiographical. Anne identified with Tessie Farrell, Fly Away Free young heroine, and although she wasn’t adopted, Anne was raised in a foster home, on a farm in northern New York at the age of twelve, after her father died two years earlier, and following her mother’s hospitalization for severe depression. Certainly, Tessie exhibited many of the same emotions that Anne must have felt throughout that difficult period in her life.

Question3- What cause are you most passionate about and why?

Continuing Anne’s legacy and sharing the importance of safe homes for children in Foster Care and adoption.

Question4- Do you have any rituals you follow when you finish a piece of work?

No!

Question5- Who has influenced you throughout your writing career?

Can’t say, possibly me. I was also writing a book at the time for Doubleday.

Question6- What are some of your long term goals?

Learning how to use social media more effectively to be able to share these stories.