Illustrated by Ron Lightburn.
'If there is one thing Cindy knows, this is no place for a puppy. Up goes the puppy, tucked in her bag. Home goes Cindy.'
Cindy is developmentally challenged. In the home where she lives, no dogs are allowed, so she must hide her new-found puppy in her room and bundle him up when she goes to work as a cleaning woman in the house called Hospice. There she meets Jan, who is ill. He is so blind he can barely see the dog; it looks like a smudge in the dark to him. But oh, how nice to hold the puppy.
What will Cindy do? Strong-willed and loving as she may be, rules are rules. Who will care for Smudge? The answer comes in a most unexpected way, and for Cindy and her friends at the hospice, it's the perfect solution.
Winner of Mr Christie's Book Award for Best Canadian Children's Book and the BC Book Prize, the Canadian Childrens Book Centre Choice, and an American Bookseller Pick of the Lists.
