Middle Grade Monday: Towers Falling, by Jewell Parker Rhodes

 

Title: Towers Falling
Author: Jewel Parker Rhodes
Publisher: Little, Brown & Co., 2016. 228 pages.
Source: Library

Publisher's Summary:  
When her fifth-grade teacher hints that a series of lessons about home and community will culminate with one big answer about two tall towers once visible outside their classroom window, Deja can't help but feel confused. She sets off on a journey of discovery, with new friends Ben and Sabeen by her side. But just as she gets closer to answering big questions about who she is, what America means, and how communities can grow (and heal), she uncovers new questions, too. Like, why does Pop get so angry when she brings up anything about the towers?

My Review: 

This deceptively simple book has some elements that are too predictable--any adult will know from the beginning what the trouble is with Deja's Pop, for example--but it does do what the author sets out to do: presents the story of 9-11 in a way that will be accessible to children born long after the rubble of the towers was cleared. Rhodes brings up issues of race and prejudice, and the children all have their own issues to deal with.

In fact, at times the relationships and circumstances feel a little too contrived. The friendship between Deja, Ben, and Sabeen is too instant and too smooth, and their three separate issues are a little too neatly complementary. Deja lives in a homeless shelter while Ben seems to have everything he could want, but of course his family is falling apart while hers sticks like glue no matter what. Sabeen has enough money and an extended family, but must deal with being Muslim in America.

In the end, the story reads well, and kept my interest despite the weaknesses, but I never really lost sight of the author's goal of making a book "that teachers could teach" about the attack on the World Trade Center.

My Recommendation:
I'd say that this is a book to use exactly as the author intends: as a supplement to explaining 9-11 to children. In fact, because of the subject matter, a child not familiar with the attack should probably not be turned loose to read it without some guidance, though the author does work hard to present the whole thing in a way that won't traumatize children, even while conveying the horror of it.

FTC Disclosure: I checked Towers Falling out of my library, and received nothing from the writer or publisher for my honest review.  The opinions expressed are my own and those of no one else.  I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."  

Middle Grade Monday: One Crazy Summer, by Rita Williams-Garcia

 

Title: One Crazy Summer
Author: Rita Williams-Garcia
Publisher: Amistad, 2010. 217 pages.
Source: Library

Publisher's Summary:
In the summer of 1968, after travelling from Brooklyn to Oakland, California, to spend a month with the mother they barely know, eleven-year-old Delphine and her two younger sisters arrive to a cold welcome as they discover that their mother, a dedicated poet and printer, is resentful of the intrusion of their visit and wants them to attend a nearby Black Panther summer camp.

In a humorous and breakout book by Williams-Garcia, the Penderwicks meet the Black Panthers. 

My Review:  

Before I start my review, I'm going to share the list of awards this book has received: 

Newbery Honor (2011), Scott O'Dell Award (2011), Dorothy Canfield Fisher Children's Book Award Nominee (2012), Coretta Scott King Award for Author (2011), Publishers Weekly's Best Children's Books of the Year for Fiction (2010) The Judy Lopez Memorial Award for Children's Literature Honor (2011), National Book Award Finalist for Young People's Literature (2010), Goodreads Choice Award Nominee (2010)

With that much confirmation that it is a good book, what can I say? I read this because I stumbled on the sequel, P.S.: Be Eleven and was intrigued by the characters, the setting, and a view into a different world from my own. Of course, being me, I had to read the books in order, so I sent for this one through the library.

So do I think it's worth all those awards? Probably maybe. I like the description above, of "the Penderwicks meet the Black Panthers," because it does have some of that feel. There is a huge potential weight in this book, but it is kept at bay by a good grip on humor, and maybe the absurd (did the Black Panthers run summer camps for kids? I am not completely sure about that, but they did invent the free breakfast program). It's good to be shown another side of something that the media painted with a pretty broad brush at the time, and maybe ever since.

Like many children's books, this is also about family, and what it means. I think Delphine and her sisters get some lessons there, but not as big a lesson as their mother does.

My Recommendation:
Definitely worth reading, for both an engaging story and an historical education. I will be reading the sequel(s) soon.


FTC Disclosure: I checked One Crazy Summer out of my library, and received nothing from the writer or publisher for my honest review.  The opinions expressed are my own and those of no one else.  I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."  

Middle Grade Monday: Beyond the Bright Sea

 

Title: Beyond the Bright Sea
Author: Lauren Wolk
Publisher: Dutton Children's Books, 2017. 283 pages.
Source: Library

Publisher's Summary:Twelve-year-old Crow has lived her entire life on a tiny, isolated piece of the starkly beautiful Elizabeth Islands in Massachusetts. Abandoned and set adrift on a small boat when she was just hours old, Crow's only companions are Osh, the man who rescued and raised her, and Miss Maggie, their fierce and affectionate neighbor across the sandbar.

Crow has always been curious about the world around her, but it isn't until the night a mysterious fire appears across the water that the unspoken question of her own history forms in her heart. Soon, an unstoppable chain of events is triggered, leading Crow down a path of discovery and danger.

Vivid and heart wrenching, Lauren Wolk's Beyond the Bright Sea is a gorgeously crafted and tensely paced tale that explores questions of identity, belonging, and the true meaning of family.

My Review: 
I picked this book up because I read and was impressed by the author's first book, Wolf Hollow. Though this book was very different, it provided me with further proof that Lauren Wolk is a writer to watch. This book is, in some ways, a mystery, but it's a mystery that is all about the meaning of family and the meaning of love. Wolk throws in some high-stakes adventure, and nails the coming-of-age novel yet again as Crow learns what is important.

The prose is beautiful, and the story powerful. It's not the adventure and the scary bits that make it so, not for me anyway. For me, the power is in the slow sorting-out of the relationships between Crow, Osh, and Miss Maggie, as well as the other islanders. I was left with some things that I still wanted to know, but as those are the very things that Crow has spent the book learning aren't important, I guess I should be satisfied!

The time and place (it's set in the 1920s on some pretty remote islands) is beautifully evoked, giving me a feel for the slower pace of the life Crow is living. I thought at first there were no other people about, but gradually realized that there is a more sinister reason why Crow only associates with the two adults. So the story is also about human fear and how cruel it can make us.

In that sense, it is much the same as Wolf Hollow, and is a book we all need to read.

My Recommendation:
This is perfectly keyed for the upper-elementary crowd (9-12), but it is so well-written and evocative of another time and place that I think most adults will enjoy it as well. Wolk also shines a light on a bit of history (I won't say what because that would be a spoiler) that most of us know little about, but which isn't one of our more shining moments. This is a writer to watch.

FTC Disclosure: I checked Beyond the Bright Sea out of my library, and received nothing from the writer or publisher for my honest review.  The opinions expressed are my own and those of no one else.  I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."  

Middle Grade Fiction: Gangsta Granny

 

Title: Gangsta Granny
Author: David Walliams
Publisher: Harper Collins Children's Books, 2011. 297 pages.
Source: Library

Publisher's Blurb:Another hilarious and moving novel from David Walliams, number one bestseller and fastest growing children’s author in the country. A story of prejudice and acceptance, funny lists and silly words, this new book has all the hallmarks of David’s previous bestsellers.

Our hero Ben is bored beyond belief after he is made to stay at his grandma’s house. She’s the boringest grandma ever: all she wants to do is to play Scrabble, and eat cabbage soup. But there are two things Ben doesn’t know about his grandma.
1) She was once an international jewel thief.
2) All her life, she has been plotting to steal the Crown Jewels, and now she needs Ben’s help…  

My Review: 
I got this book thanks to our March 2017 Goodreads GMGR group read. It was a bit different this time: we were all supposed to pick books we thought had a particularly regional appeal, and might not do so well in other places. I flopped at thinking of something from my region, and I loved the blurb on this one chosen by Jemima Pett, so I read it.

First off: Though this is a distinctly British book, the fact that I find it, and most of Walliams' books, in my county library system in California suggests that maybe it's not *too* much limited to a local appeal! And I delighted in the fact that it bucked the recent trends, and the "Britishisms" in the book weren't translated for the poor, stupid American kids (can you tell that's a pet peeve?).

So, was it a good read? You bet! I enjoyed the well balanced humor and action, the valuable messages hidden inside the humor, and the generally just slightly absurd take on life. In that sense, I think it is definitely a British book, in the tradition of Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett, even P. G. Wodehouse. So if you think those folks are just too weird for words, maybe this won't be your book. But if you're open to a fun romp with some life lessons wrapped up in absurdity, go for it.

What else can I say? The plot is absurd, but it knows it and it means to be. I laughed aloud more than once as I zipped through this in a single sitting (despite the page count, the font and layout means it's not a terribly long book. I read it in under 2 hours). And I cried a little, too. Oh, and squirmed like crazy when poor Ben found himself on stage. The writing is at times self-reflective, with asides to the reader that also bring a smile or a laugh. I felt like Walliams has a pretty good idea what makes kids tick.

My Recommendation:
Like I say, good for those who appreciate the absurd. I think it's a book that will appeal to reluctant readers, maybe especially boys but also a lot of girls. There are lots of great pictures, by Tony Ross, and great adventures with Granny! Reading level struck me as being about 8 and up, and interest level similar--the older the reader, the more they will get from it, but young kids will enjoy the romp.

FTC Disclosure: I checked Gangsta Granny out of my library, and received nothing from the writer or publisher for my honest review.  The opinions expressed are my own and those of no one else.  I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."  

Middle Grade Monday: Cynthia Voigt and the Tillermans

Sort of a dual review of Homecoming and Dicey's Song,  the first two books of the Tillerman cycle by Cynthia Voigt. A review of #3, A Solitary Blue, will come separately as these two are the books of the cycle that are really about Dicey.

    
I couldn't find an image of the cover of Homecoming from the hardback I read. I did find it for Dicey's Song, so I'm including it. I think I like it better.

Publisher: Homecoming: Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 1981. 320 pages.
Dicey's Song: Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 1982. 204 pages.

Source: Library





Summary:
Homecoming follows the four Tillerman children--Dicey, age 13, James (10), Maybeth (9), and Sammy (6) after their mother walks away from them in a shopping mall parking lot. They find their way, mostly walking, to their great-aunt's house in Bridgeport, but nothing there is what they expected. So the Tillermans set out again, in search of the home they need.

In Dicey's Song, the siblings are settled with their grandmother, but that turns out not to be the end of Dicey's work. There are a number of problems to solve, and Dicey and her grandmother both have a lot to learn about being a family, and about reaching out to a hand that's reaching to them.

My Review:
Because these books date back to my high school college years, they do have a feeling of being of another time (as an aside, it is only when reading books from that era that I believe things were really that different then). I would hope that those differences wouldn't stop a modern child from reading, because I think anyone would admire Dicey and the inner strength that keeps her going when she has no idea what she's doing.

The "Great Middle Grades Reads" Goodreads group has discussing in the past the trope of the dead/absent parent in middle grade books, and the way in which that can be used to set the children free to be independent. In this case, the absent parents force Dicey to grow up--but what she is already mature enough to know is that they most need a parent. She's not looking for adventure, but Dicey is willing to take a lot of chances and tell all the lies she needs to in order to keep the family together and find a home. The lost parents don't feel at all like a trope; they feel like a tragedy.

Dicey is an interesting protagonist. She is often prickly and difficult, and I at times wanted to shake her and insist she let people into her life and pay attention to them. But that was, after all, what she had to learn to do. After being in charge from far too young an age, as the children's mother became more and more mentally ill and incapable, she'd become too self-reliant and untrusting, and very nearly lost her way a few times. In the end, I liked Dicey, prickles and all, and was wholly absorbed in her story. And that, after all, is what books should do.

I was very glad there was a sequel and I could get it quickly, because I did feel that the first book left almost as many things hanging as it tied up. By the end of the second book, I felt better about leaving her. In a lot of ways, the two really should be one fat book, though the first does have enough of an ending to satisfy most kids, anyway.

Both books won multiple awards, and I think they are justified. I even think these are books that might appeal to both adults and the children for whom they were written.

Recommendation: 
I recommend the series for kids maybe 11 or 12 and up. I can't point to anything that's inappropriate for younger kids, but it just felt a little old for most grade school children. Some of that is due to the situations in which Dicey finds herself, but I think it's mostly just the level of the writing, which is not particularly simplified for young readers. I'll also recommend it for anyone (of any age) who just likes a good story.

FTC Disclosure: I checked these books out of my library, and received nothing from the writer or publisher in exchange for my honest review.  The opinions expressed are my own and those of no one else.  I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."  

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The price for The Ninja Librarian has dropped to 99 cents for the ebook, at Amazon or Smashwords. So get a copy and discover the world of Skunk Corners for yourself!

  

Middle Grade Review: The Turn of the Tide

Title: The Turn of the Tide
Author: Roseanne Parry
Publisher: Random House Books for Young Readers, 304 pages.
Source: Library

Summary: 
(I really didn't like the publisher's summary, which I found misleading), so I'm writing my own this time).

Kai has lost nearly everything he cares about in a tsunami. To make it worse, his parents send him from their devastated home in Japan to stay with and aunt and uncle he scarcely knows in Astoria, Oregon, instead of letting him stay to do the honorable thing and help clean up. His cousin Jet isn't too sure she wants him, either, despite her sympathy for him. She has her own problems. Together, the two find their connection through the thing they both love most: sailing. A summer's adventures in their small boat brings them healing and maybe the way to fulfill their dreams.

Review:
This wasn't a terribly deep or significant book in some ways, but it did offer an interesting take on a number of things (actually, that is my main criticism: I think it took in too many things). Jet and Kai have to learn together to help him find the healing he needs when his long-standing love of the sea collides with his new-found (and not unreasonable) fear of the ocean that brought such devastation to his life and his town. At the same time, Jet has to deal with changes in her friends after a year of Junior High, and she never lets go of her ambition: to be a bar pilot, guiding ships into the mouth of the Columbia--just like her father, and just like exactly one other woman in all the history of shipping in the river. Quite a few things are sorted out in a rather exciting finish to the story (which I really liked), as each of the cousins has to overcome fears to do what needs doing.

Even though I thought the author tried to take in too many things--I'd probably have dropped the whole changes-to-her-friends thread--the book was a fast, engaging read, and I had trouble putting it down once I passed the midpoint. Roseanne Parry has created very real and likable characters, with both good and bad traits, and deals well with the ways their different cultures shaped the two cousins (differences that made it realistically hard for them to relate at first).

I loved the historical note at the end that told about the history of the bar pilots on the Columbia--apparently one of the trickier river mouths around (and there really is, or was, only one female pilot). Part of the interest in this for me is that my mom rather wanted to be a (ship's) pilot when she was growing up, and I always wondered about how true it was that the profession was pretty much not open to women. Seeing how few and far between women are in the 21st Century, I have to concede that it would have been an uphill battle indeed to break into the profession in the 1950s.

Recommendation:
A good read for boys and girls, maybe 9-12, who like adventure and boats, or even just like thinking about boats.

Full Disclosure: I checked The Turn of the Tide out of my library, and received nothing from the writer or publisher in exchange for my honest review.  The opinions expressed are my own and those of no one else.  I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising." 

Middle Grade Review: Listen, Slowly

 

Title:  Listen, Slowly

Author: Thanhha Lai (my apologies to the author for not knowing how to reproduce the diacritical marks in her name)

Publisher: Harper, 2015. 260 pages.

Source: Library

Summary: 

12-year-old Mai Le is ready to spend the summer at the beach in Laguna, CA with her best friend. But her family has other plans. Her grandmother has heard from a detective in Vietnam who has information about the grandfather who disappeared during the war. Now Ba can't rest until she goes home to learn if Ong might still be alive. And Mai is told off to accompany her because her parents are too busy, as Mai says, "doing good." The girl's resentment gradually melts as she finds that some things might be more important than the beach.

Review:

First, can I just say that this book has the most beautiful cover?! I love it. And the book is lovely enough to match the cover. Mai is an entirely human girl, neither inhumanly dedicated to her grandmother nor so totally self-centered as to irritate the heck out of me (she is just as self-centered as a 12-year-old should be). She resents what she has been asked to do and give up, but not so much as to fail to--gradually--come to recognize what she has been given instead. I'd say that, in a nutshell, the whole book is about acceptance, peace, and priorities. As Mai makes peace with her task, and connects with the extended family she's never known, Ba also finds peace. Watching those two take care of each other is part of the beauty of the story. 

I think that while the story has a great deal of appeal to adults on some levels that kids may not get or appreciate, it is also (as cannot be said about all books we grown-ups love) a story that I think will resonate with children. Mai is delightfully human, and while many kids may not relate to the obedience to her elders that is part of the culture she has inherited despite her American upbringing, all can relate to what happens when she is pushed outside her comfortable world and given something real to do.

Recommendation:

I think this is one that really does appeal to both kids and adults. I'd say more girls than boys (not just because Mai is female, but because she is a bit obsessed with a boy), and probably from ages 10 or 11 up. References to the war are mostly oblique, but some of the reality of war does come through.

See also my review of Inside Out and Back Again, by the same author.

Full Disclosure: I checked Listen, Slowly, out of my library, and received nothing from the writer or publisher in exchange for my honest review.  The opinions expressed are my own and those of no one else.  I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."

Middle Grade Review: Fly Away by Patricia MacLachlan

Title: Fly Away
Author: Patricia MacLachlan
Publisher: Margaret K. McElderry Books, 2014.  44 pages.
Source: Library ebook

Summary: 
Lucy is the only one in her family who doesn't sing. Even her baby brother, who can't yet talk, sings to her at night when the others are asleep.  Singing is what the family does, just like they go every year to help out Aunt Frankie. When the river floods Aunt Frankie's farm, everything comes together: family and music and poetry and the river.

Review:
Like most of Patricia MacLachlan's books, Fly Away is very short and deceptively simple. In just 44 pages--about a half hour's reading for me--we are given a family dynamic and a little girl who is trying to figure out where she belongs in a family where everyone sings, but she just wants to be a poet. And in one terrible moment of fear, it all comes together beautifully.

MacLachlan's books is like a poem itself--spare and simple words with a lot said between the lines. When I read a book like this, part of me really wants to read the rest of the book--the party the author didn't write, that fills in all the details of the story. But that's not a bad thing.

Recommendation:
I don't know if this is as as easy a read as it looks. With its brevity and simple writing, it seems like it would be for kids just breaking into chapter books. But, like Sarah, Plain and Tall, which has much more in it than the length and simplicity of the story would suggest, it probably takes an older reader to unpack much of what it is really about. So maybe this is a book for all ages. Certainly an older child who thinks a lot but reads poorly would appreciate the simplicity of the language and the complexity of the story, as did I.

Full Disclosure: I checked Fly Away out of my digital library, and received nothing from the writer or publisher in exchange for my honest review.  The opinions expressed are my own and those of no one else.  I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."

Hop over to the Kid Lit Blog Hop for more great blogs about kids' books!

Kid Lit Blog Hop! Ghosts of Tupelo Landing

 

Title: The Ghosts of Tupelo Landing, 352 pp.
Author: Sheila Turnage
Publisher: Kathy Dawson Books (Penguin), 2014

Summary:
Mo LoBeau and her partner Dale are back and their Desperado Detective Agency is taking on their toughest challenge yet: they need to interview a ghost and save the worn-out old Tupelo Inn for Miss Lana and Grandmother Miss Lacy.  They have a lot of motivation: not only will the whole town suffer if someone nasty ends up with the Inn, Mo and Dale need that interview to pass their 6th grade History class.  All our old friends from Three Times Lucky are back, and a few new ones.

Review:
I have to get something off my chest right from the start: I read (and reviewed a couple of weeks ago) another book with a ghost, and I dinged it pretty hard for having a ghost, taken at face value (i.e., presented as a real ghost, seen and believed in by a number of people and no other explanation available).  Well, The Ghosts of Tupelo Landing has just that sort of ghost, and it didn't bother me (very much--I'm a little too rationalistic to be completely happy with it).  This has led me to think a lot about ghosts and how they can or can't fit into stories.  Two things about this book make the ghost work for me: for one, it's set in the South.  That's a place for ghosts, almost as good as ancient castles and baronial piles on the other side of the Atlantic.  And, maybe more important, the whole book is just a shade (uh, no pun intended!) removed from realism in any case--there's a certain over-the-top fun attitude that allows me to accept the unbelievable.

So, the ghost dealt with, did I like the story?  You bet I did!  Almost as much as I liked Three Times Lucky.  The story is fun, the narrator (Mo herself) is witty and as insightful as a 6th grader should be, and the plot is (once ghosts are accepted) logical enough to be convincing.  It zipped along, a fast read that pulled me in and kept me turning pages.  It also had a line that for some reason just doubled me up with giggles, when Miss Lana advises, with regard to ghosts, that Mo and Dale just "live and let. . . whatever."

As with Three Times Lucky, themes of family and familial love run strong in the book, and Mo is gradually settling into an acceptance of the family she has, which really works pretty well, as families go.

Highly recommended, but read the books in order, or you'll spoil the surprises in the first book.

Full Disclosure: I borrowed The Ghosts of Tupelo Landing  from my  library, and received nothing from the writer or publisher in exchange for my honest review.  The opinions expressed are my own and those of no one else.  I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."

Middle Grade Review: Bo at Ballard Creek

Bo at Ballard Creek, by Kirkpatrick Hill, illustrations by LeUyen Pham
Publisher: Henry Holt & Co., 2013
Middle Grade historical fiction

Source: Library.  I just plucked this one off the new book shelf, first because it looked like historical fiction (my favorite), and then on reading the blurb I thought it might fit in with the orphan theme I've been looking at.

Brief Summary:  This turned out not to actually be an orphan story.  Yes, Bo is an orphan (abandoned as a baby by her mother).  But she is promptly taken up by a pair of miners, Jack and Arvid, who become her Papas (she names them both Papa, which should be confusing but isn't), who are en route to the mine at Ballard Creek, Alaska, in about 1930.  So she's not an orphan--she has a pair of loving parents, not to mention the whole community at Ballard Creek who help raise her.  The book is the account of their last year at Ballard Creek, when Bo is about 5.

Review:  This book made me think of Little House in the Big Woods, both because it does something everyone will say you can't do nowadays: it's a middle-grade (say, ages 8-10) book with a much younger protagonist.  It's also more a series of sketches of life at Ballard Creek than it is a novel.  Through most of the book, not much really happens, though a single story (of a little boy who is found near the town and taken in by them all) develops through the final chapters.

So, by all the rules, this book shouldn't work at all.  And I admit I kept waiting for something to happen, holding my breath for the disaster that was surely going to strike and destroy their happy life.  But that's not the sort of book this is.  It's a soothing, pleasant account of life in a time and place that's mostly gone now.  I think there are two main points to the story: first, that a family looks like whatever works for you.  This isn't a veiled depiction of a gay couple; the miners all partner up to keep safe and sane, and there's not a whiff of sexuality anywhere in the book.  It's just saying that they're a family because they act like a family.  The second point, brought home at the end of the book and made explicit, is that nothing escapes change.

Using a very young protagonist allowed the author to look at everything in town with fresh, interested eyes.  Bo doesn't go to school, so she's not reading about the outside world, and all she knows is Ballard Creek.  That allows for a feeling as you read of being totally in that place, at that moment--as small children usually are.

As you can tell, I enjoyed this story a lot.  I'm not sure how to rate it, as some readers will feel there needs to be more action, more plot.  For them, it's probably about a 3.  But for those who like to just immerse themselves in a time and place, and let life roll by. . . it's a 5.

Full Disclosure: I checked out this copy of Bo at Ballard Creek from my library and received nothing whatsoever from the author or publisher in exchange for my honest review.  The opinions expressed in this review are my own and no one else's.

Notice: This blog is posting itself in my absence.  If you comment, I WILL respond. . . but not for a few weeks.  This does not mean I no longer love you.  It just means I've gone hiking.

Middle-grade review: The Flight of the Doves

Kid Lit Blog Hop day! 

After the fun I had last week with two old favorites, I decided to go ahead with one more of my old "orphan books."  So here is my review:
The Flight of the Doves, by Walter Macken.
Published by Scholastic Books, 1968.  224 pages.
I bought this book from the Scholastic book advertising flyer thingie (you remember those, right?  Kids still get them, too) with my own pocket money when I was in grade school, shortly after it was published.  Did I just admit that?

Brief Summary: Finn and Derval Dove are living in England with "Uncle Toby," who married their mother after their father died.  Their mother is now dead as well, and Toby isn't nice to them at all.  In fact, he's abusive.  One night things come to a head, and the two children run away that very night.  Their destination: their Granny O'Flaherty somewhere in the west of Ireland.  Finn is 12, Derval 7, and neither knows exactly where they are going--until news coverage of their case gives it away.  They cross Ireland on foot and with help from various people, and come in the end to find the family they need.

Review: I think this might be the perfect balance of adventure for the middle grade child.  There is excitement, narrow escapes, and lots of creativity and initiative required from Finn (Derval is not a very developed character; she is the small child who provides both a reason for Finn to do what he does and the greatest source of anxiety during the process).  But the danger is never life-threatening, unless you count being sent back to an abusive and loveless existence.  And what they do feels totally believable.  There are no exceptional skills on their part, no super powers or even knowledge beyond what any kid Finn's age would have known in the 1960s.  He does it all with stubbornness and determination, and just enough adult help to be believable.

The writing style feels a little odd.  I'm not sure if it's dated or just that the author is making a conscious effort to keep it within the parameters for children of a certain age, but sentences feel short and declarative.  Nonetheless, it reads well and the writing feels more like a stylistic choice than a grade-level requirement.  The plot, as noted, is believable, and the story develops quickly and moves fast enough that I have trouble putting the book down, even though I've probably read it a dozen times or more.

Four and a half stars.
 

Full Disclosure: I bought this copy of The Flight of the Doves when I was in grade school, and received nothing whatsoever from the author or publisher in exchange for my honest review.  The opinions expressed in this review are my own and no one else's.


Notice: This blog is posting itself in my absence.  If you comment, I WILL respond. . . but not for a few weeks.  This does not mean I no longer love you.  It just means I've gone hiking.