Novel offers young readers a dilemma: What to do with a lost baby?

You might think it would be easy to decide what to do if you came across a young child alone in a field. But in St. Paul writer Cheryl Blackford's new book, "Lizzie and the Lost Baby," a 10-year-old girl finds herself facing a horrible dilemma.

Blackford moved to Minnesota years ago. But she grew up in Yorkshire, in the north of England. She knows the story of how, during World War II, 3.5 million children were evacuated into the country to escape German bombing.

"And they went to live with strangers," she said. "And Lizzie is one of those evacuees."

Lizzie and her younger brother Peter are sent to a small farming community in the hilly area known as the Yorkshire Dales. They find the villagers cold and unwelcoming. Homesickness quickly settles in.

As Lizzie and Peter set off to try to mail letters home, they hear a noise from a field. At first they think it's an animal, but they find a baby girl alone on a blanket:

The baby's cries reached a volume which Lizzie wouldn't have believed possible from something so small. Where were her parents?

"Hello?" Lizzie called. "Your baby's crying!"

A blackbird trilled from the branches above them. No-one else answered.

The children take the baby back to the village, and that's where things get complicated. It turns out the child is from a Roma family, what the villagers call a gypsy. Her name is Rose, and she's not been abandoned. Her brother Elijah, who thought he'd only be gone for a few minutes, has been forced by an unscrupulous adult to leave her behind. He desperately wants her back.

But the villagers, deeply suspicious of the Roma, decide they will keep the baby. They believe Rose will have a better life with them, and they entrust her to a woman who recently suffered the death of her own child.

Elijah appeals to Lizzie for help. Lizzie, Blackford said, is left with the judgment of Solomon.

"She has to decide the fate of that baby," said Blackford. "And no matter what she decides, someone that she likes is going to be hurt by her decision."

It's a complicated moral tale, and I wondered how a middle grader, someone in the target age for the book, would react.

Ten-year old Bea Tortorello, a fourth-grader at Capitol Hill Magnet School in St. Paul and a bookworm, agreed to read "Lizzie and the Lost Baby." As it turned out, she was the first young reader Blackford had met to have read the entire book.

Bea had some questions. "I was sort of wondering why people hated the Gypsies so much," she said.

"I think it's because people don't like it when someone is different," replied Blackford.

Blackford explained that Roma people faced prejudice in Britain. During her research, she consulted writer Maggie Smith-Bendell. Her memoir, "Rabbit Stew and a Penny or Two," describes Roma life on the road in England just after the war.

Smith-Bendell agreed to read drafts of the "Lizzie" book. She told Blackford she felt it was an accurate depiction of the prejudice faced by travelers.

"She actually has a story in her memoir where a farmer's wife wanted to keep her younger brother," Blackford said. "So I think it had echoes of that for her."

Blackford said Smith-Bendell arranged for her to see some traditional Roma caravans in England. They're compact and organized carefully to make the best use of space. Blackford showed the photographs to Bea Tortorello.

"That's the inside," said Blackford, showing Bea a picture on her iPad.

"Wow! That's really pretty," Bea gasped.

"That's fancy isn't it, yeah?" said Blackford.

"I would have never guessed that they had a stove," said Bea.

The pictures are available on Blackford's website. She'll talk about them at the publication party for "Lizzie and the Lost Baby" at the Red Balloon Bookshop in St. Paul at 2 p.m. Saturday.

But she wanted to know what Bea thought of the book itself. Not mincing words, the young reader said she thought there was too much description at the beginning of the story.

"It's really good, but I'm just saying if you put in too much, kids find it boring," she said.

Blackford said it's good advice: Get to the action fast.