Pie

Children’s author Sarah Weeks first published her mid-grade novel Pie in 2011. The story combines coming-of-age, mystery, and action-adventure genres as it follows 10-year-old protagonist Alice Anderson, whose beloved aunt, Polly Portman, suddenly dies in the summer of 1955. Polly’s death does not devastate Alice alone but rocks the entire village of Ipswitch, Pennsylvania. Polly’s remarkable pie shop is known throughout the nation, with Polly having won 13 straight annual Blueberry Awards for making the country’s best pie. Most of the community’s economy is centered on the pie shop, leaving citizens to wonder how to proceed financially. Making matters worse, someone vandalizes the pie shop, apparently looking for Polly’s secret piecrust recipe. Things are not going well at home for Alice, whose mother continues to harbor jealousy toward her older sister, even threatening to send the cat, Lardo, whom Polly left to Alice, to the pound. Through all her struggles, Alice’s only solace comes from her surprising new friendship with her loyal classmate Charlie.

This guide uses the Scholastic Gold 2019 paperback edition.

Plot Summary

The narrative begins in July 1955 when Polly Portman holds the hand of her niece, Alice Anderson, and thanks her in the hours before Polly dies. The story moves to a description of Polly as a child who loves to make pies. She becomes such a phenomenal baker that many encourage her to open her own pie shop. With the bequest left to her by her parents in 1941, Polly opens a shop called PIE. She bakes pies and gives them away rather than selling them. Responding to her generosity, her customers bring her the finest baking ingredients. News spreads regionally and then nationally so that people come from all over the country to enjoy her pies and bring her the best natural produce to use in baking. Though Polly never marries or has children, her younger sister, Ruth Anderson, gives birth to daughter Alice in 1945. Polly and Alice adore one another from the beginning, and Alice spends all her free time cooking with Polly in her shop. Ruth, who feels their mother favored Polly, resents the closeness of Alice and Polly.

The entire community shows up for Polly’s funeral. Charlie Erdling, a classmate of Alice, sits beside her, which surprises her since they are not close. Alice watches the whole church full of people file by Polly’s casket. She notices a woman in black whom she does not know walking against the flow of mourners and also sees her principal, Miss Gurke, reach into the casket.

Polly’s lawyer calls to speak to Alice, telling her Polly included her in her will. Ruth believes that Polly has bequeathed the secret piecrust recipe to her, which is worth millions of dollars. It is the main reason Polly won 13 straight Blueberry Awards for baking the best pies in the US Alice learns that Polly left her pie shop to Reverend Flowers, bequeathed her disagreeable cat, Lardo, to Alice, and willed her piecrust recipe to Lardo. Everyone assumes this means she left the piecrust recipe to the cat, which is the next day’s newspaper headline. This infuriates Ruth, who believes Polly mocks them from the grave. Ruth decides she will take up baking pies and win the Blueberry Award herself. She announces that Lardo will go to the pound. Alice discovers her bedroom window open and the cat missing.

Sylvia DeSota, a Look magazine reporter, is downstairs when Alice tries to tell her mother about Lardo. Sylvia presses Ruth for the piecrust recipe and, hearing that Ruth is baking, decides Ruth is keeping the recipe herself. Searching for Lardo, Alice goes to the pie shop and finds the door open and the interior completely trashed. She surprises Charlie, who also saw the open door. Together, they search the shop and adjoining apartment and rescue Polly’s 13 Blueberry Awards. The two decide that someone looking for something tore up the pie shop. Headed to Alice’s house, they see Chief Decker and tell him about the break-in. After having lunch, they find a woman’s earring that does not belong to her mother, making Alice think someone has taken Lardo. Ruth’s pie comes out of the oven looking and smelling awful. Alice discusses the break-in with her parents. She says that Polly was not wearing her shop key around her neck in the casket, leading to a confrontation with Ruth. Outside, Alice criticizes Charlie sharply for deserting her. He retorts that Polly never spoke to anyone that way.

When Charlie returns to find the shopping list he misplaced for Miss Gurke, Alice realizes items on the list imply that their principal has the cat. They ride bikes to Miss Gurke’s house, where they hear guttural noises in the backyard. Charlie inadvertently dumps Alice over the fence into the backyard, where she sees the principal in a tight, red workout suit, punching a weight bag. Charlie, meanwhile, rings the front door to distract Miss Gurke and let Alice escape. Instead, the three have a conversation in which the principal explains that she is a female bodybuilder who is intent on setting a new path for women’s perfection.

Riding their bikes back to Alice’s, they see Chief Decker at her home. He has returned Lardo, found wandering in the village. The cat seems drunk, and the chief explains that someone drugged the cat with sleeping powder, suggesting it was the work of mischievous teenagers. Ruth offers the chief a slice of her pie, sending Alice into the kitchen to retrieve it. The pie has disappeared. The next morning, Alice decides to reconcile with her mother, who accuses her of getting rid of the pie. Ruth says that Alice wants her to fail, just as Polly wanted her to fail, and that Alice loved Polly more than her. Distraught, Alice says that the difference between the two women is that Polly loved her in return. She rides away on her bicycle.

Alice rides to the top of a tall hill near the Ipsy Inn, where Charlie joins her. They see Sylvia dump Ruth’s pie out the motel window and drive away. Following her on their bikes, they see her stop at Mayor Henry Needleman’s house. Alice sneaks into her car and finds an earring that matches the one she found in her room. Alice realizes Sylvia catnapped Lardo and probably ransacked the pie shop. She explains to Charlie how she wants to set a trap for Sylvia. Charlie rings the Needleman’s doorbell and asks the mayor if he can speak to his daughter, Nora, who is also a classmate. On the porch, Charlie asks Nora to go to a movie with him, saying that Alice will not go with him since she found Polly’s piecrust recipe and has it under her pillow. Charlie speaks so loudly that everyone in the house can hear him.

Alice helps Charlie deliver groceries to many households throughout Ipswitch that afternoon. Alice goes to bed early, waiting to see if Sylvia will appear. Charlie climbs into her room, saying he has been outside watching. They hear someone outside. A woman dressed in black enters, only to suffer an attack by Lardo. Charlie grabs her as she tries to go out the window. Alice’s parents come upstairs and discover that Sylvia is actually Jane Quizenberry, a pie chef who continually lost the Blueberry Award to Polly. Ruth stays with Alice through the night.

Charlie brings Alice the special peaches Polly used, and, for the first time, Alice bakes a pie herself. Mr. Gerald Hammerschlacht rings the doorbell and explains to Ruth that he is the founder of Lardo shortening. Polly actually left the piecrust recipe to him, with the provision that Lardo print the recipe on the side of each package. Polly also insisted that Alice write a jingle for Lardo commercials that Ruth will sing. The resulting commercial becomes a decade’s long staple for the company, insuring an income for their family.

In the Epilogue, set in 1995, Charlie marries Nora, and together they have five children, with a middle child named Polly, who loves to bake pies. Like her aunt. Alice never marries and continues to live happily in her family’s home in Ipswitch.