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Published by Atheneum, New York
Copyright 1974
Library of Congress Catalog Card 73-84824 - ISBN 0-689-30134-0
This was Pete's third foster home in as many years and when he hears his foster brother say he couldn't bear Pete and the boy's mother agreed, something snapped. He decides to run away to his only living relative, an aunt who sends him ten dollars every Christmas. Never mind that he's in a California beach town and she lives in the Virgin Islands, that held never met her and he was nearly broke.
A relative might be prejudiced in his favor and he had a passion for marine biology. The first night, while camping on the beach, he meets Barney and because of him, falls and dislocates a shoulder. Barney's hippy grandmother, Lily, takes him to a doctor and then arranges a truck trip with a carnival worker as far as Texas for both boys. They pick up jobs in a carnival, the only place Pete can work where the social welfare department won't find him and bring him back "for his own good". Pete loves the life and turns into a good carnie but Barney runs up gambling debts. Pete and Barney work in the carnival until they have enough money to join Barney's grandmother in the cheapie Florida trailer camp where she's moved.
Then Pete makes the final hop to the Virgin Islands, where he finds a simpatico cousin and an aunt who is decidedly reluctant until a hurricane allows Pete to prove his worth. After the hurricane Pete finds the courage to choose his own life and to pursue the observation and study of Marine Biology.
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