1990 - Number the Stars

Lois Lowry just seems to have the gift of writing novels of great ideas and depth with a spare hand, drawing young (and old) readers, into her stories without lots of superfluous pages. Number the Stars is historical fiction at its best—it is the story of two Danish girls, one of Jewish ancestry, and of their families who are trying to cope with the Nazi invaders of their country, Denmark.

Annemaire is the middle sister; she also has a little sister Kirsti, annoying, like little sisters can often be. Her older sister Lise is dead, and her parents won’t talk about it. Ellen is Annemarie’s best friend, and when the word slips out that the Nazis intend on collecting and relocating the Danish Jews, Annemarie’s family moves to help Ellen’s family. There are many secrets, most kept to protect the children or other participants in the resistance movement. Annemarie, as she becomes involved, is entrusted with some of those secrets, and faces her moment of  courage when the outcome of the mission rests on the success of her actions.

Even though this book, in total, is a work of fiction, enough of the details are from real historical events that it seems like a work of reality. Lowry chronicles the facts in a short afterword.

I enjoyed this little 132- page novel quite a bit. The story is told from the child’s viewpoint so the story isn’t cluttered up with a lot of explanations about Hitler and Fascism or even what the Jews were actually facing; it just tells how Annemarie experience the events  and how she perceived the crisis from the words and actions of her family.

I bought this book from Goodwill for about a dollar.

1998 - Out of the Dust

I’ve had Out of the Dust, by Karen Hesse for a year or two, just sitting on the shelf, unread. I never was in the mood for what I assumed the story would be. I figured it would be another one of those, “Poor Okie Kid” books, suffering her way through poverty, hard times, the Great Depression, and possibly a tragedy or two before, hopefully, coming to a good place in life, or possibly, ending in disaster, like many books who mess with your emotions. And in some ways, that’s what this book is—but not.

One disconcerting detail you’ll notice about this book is that, while it is a novel, it is not in a strict novel format. Out of the Dust is written in free-verse poems, each one advancing the storyline, each one with a date at the bottom to help the reader keep track of the passage of time, covering about two years of 14 yr old Billie Jo’s life. Billie Jo tells the story in her own words, in a spare, sometimes stark, honest, yet elegant and eloquent way that is fully believable as a young teen’s voice. In a way, this style kept me from skimming or rushing through less interesting sections in way which I am used to doing in many novels. As you follow the story, there aren’t clouds of words to bathe your mind in; each word is important, and you want to read each word, understanding her life.

Billie Jo is a farmer’s daughter; he is trying to raise wheat in Oklahoma during the mid 1930’s, the time of the Dust Bowl. Billie Jo has a lot to think about, her parents becoming increasingly tense because of the drought, her baby brother about to be born, boys, and her passion for music that lifts her and gives her hope for a future out of the dust.

When some really bad things happen that threaten everything, even her relationships, then you get to the part where you can’t put the book down. As the days pass, and she makes choices, Billie Jo begins to understand her own heart and realize her own strength, leading to an ending that is not pat or necessarily anticipated.

Out of the Dust has won many awards, and I can see why. It is obviously a book that elementary and middle schools would require their students to read, to be inspired by a heroine who learns about courage, truth and sorrow, and to gain understanding about an era in our nation’s past.

I picked this book up at a Goodwill for under about a dollar.

1973 - Julie of the Wolves

Julie of the Wolves is one of the books that all school-age children seem to have been required to read. It was written while I was in high school, so it wasn’t until my own children were in school that I heard of it. I wasn’t sure it would be my kind of book, but the magic Newbery seal brought it into my hands.

Although the girl’s name, according to the title, is Julie, for the first third of the book, we only know her as Miyax. Miyax is an Eskimo girl, about 12 years old, who lives in the northern region of Alaska with her father, a man skilled in the old Eskimo ways of living. But at first we are only given hints of Miyax’s life and the crisis that compelled her to flee and cross the tundra to civilization. At the start of the book, Miyax is lost and knows that she will starve to death if she cannot learn the ways of the nearby wolf pack and get them to accept her. As Miyax learns, so do we, about the individuality of the pack members and the relationships they have formed with each other. The girl finally becomes a sort of cub to the wolves and finds, with that acceptance, life.

Part two takes the reader back to Miyax’s former life in the hunting village of her father, Kapugen. The life Miyax has known and loved comes to an end when Kapugen is forced to send her to her aunt’s house to go to school where she also learns modern ways. Now, the Eskimo girl Miyax becomes Julie. But soon, events conspire that make her living situation intolerable. She runs away, believing that it is within her abilities to make it on her own to San Francisco to join her beloved pen pal, Amy. She packs a small amount of food and other supplies and leaves; she is now the Eskimo girl, Miyax again.

Miyax continues her struggle to cross the tundra as autumn approaches, her wolf pack always near. As she struggles on towards her destination, she is forced to consider and reconsider all she has known and been, and what riches of traditional Eskimo life she will claim for herself.

At the time my children read Julie of the Wolves, they did not like it, because it was “meaningful.” Often they preferred light-hearted, exciting books that were amusing and entertaining, but were quickly forgotten. But the books that affect you, make you think, stay in your mind, change you—those are the books that are like nourishing real food, not a fluffy dessert. That type of book marks a Newbery Award book, and that describes Julie of the Wolves.

I bought this book for under a dollar at the thrift store.

1991 - Maniac Magee

Maniac Magee is a legend, perhaps a myth, perhaps a real kid who might have or might not have done all the things attributed to him. So the prelude warns us that the history of a kid is one part fact, two parts legend, and three parts snowball before beginning the story of Maniac Magee.

The boy’s early history is shortened down to a couple pages, setting Maniac, an orphan who ran away from an unhappy home to the town of Two Mills, two hundred miles away. And the running is literal. Maniac’s running is part of his legend; he can outrun just about anyone. Other unusual skills pop up later to distinguish him from the usual gang of kids.

This kid is a sort of innocent. He has no understanding of bigotry or racial segregation. So when he plops into the Black side of town, he doesn’t get what he is up against, from both Blacks and Whites. He is a kid alone, who just needs a family, and it doesn’t matter much what color the folks are.

There are frustrating and sad moments in the story, as Maniac struggles to find his place among the people of Two Mills, while at the same time enhancing his legendary status with both sides, sort of like a tragic superhero.

I enjoyed the book well enough, though I wouldn’t say it was in my top group. His interactions with the Black folks on the other side of the tracks were fun and interesting, and sometimes thought provoking. But for me, I couldn’t feel close to Maniac; I couldn’t get to know him until near the end of the book. It seemed to me that the point of the book was more important than the thoughts, feelings, “innards” of the boy.

I picked this book up at Goodwill for a buck fifty.

1995 - Walk Two Moons

Walk Two Moons, by Sharon Creech, has been sitting on my shelf for quite a few months. If I had had any idea of what a marvelous book this was, I would have read it long ago!

This is, quite simply, one of the best novels for young readers that I have read. “Richly layered” begins to describe it. There are several stories going on at once here, and they weave gracefully between each other, building interest and intrigue.

What makes a book delicious for me is when the author keeps a close hand in revealing details, secrets, motivations. They are parceled out, each naturally in its own time, the characters becoming more rounded, their actions more meaningful as the story progresses.

Sal, the 13 year old protagonist has to leave the farm in Kentucky that she grew up in after her mother left. She’s dropped into a new situation in the town where they move, starting school, making friends. Everyone around her has interesting secrets, some for her to find out as she is able to bear to hear them, and some that are revealed in the stories she tells about them. There are some stories-within-stories, as Sal tells the tale of Phoebe, her new friend, to amuse and distract her grandparents during the drive out west they take to visit her mother.

Creech crafts what would be ordinary points in her book to become charming, memorable treats to the story. I loved the telling of how Sal got named and what it was supposed to mean.

I let this book set on the shelf for awhile because the title didn’t appeal to me. I thought it was a character’s “Indian name,” and that it might be more meaningful than entertaining, not what I was in the mood for. Instead, it refers to a saying, “Don’t judge a man until you’ve walked two moons in his moccasins,” a gentle theme of the book as Sal and those around her do learn to see things from other’s points of view.

I picked this book up at Goodwill for about a buck and a half I think.

1997 - The View From Saturday

I picked this book up, used, at a Thrift store. On the surface, it didn’t look like anything special, and the title was strange and not very revealing. But then I saw the familiar gold seal on the front and knew it would be worth a read; it was a Newbery Medal Winner.

The writing method used in this book is a little unusual. In the hands of someone less skilled, it might have been confusing and disjointed. But The View From Saturday is not; it draws the reader in to know and care about the characters, and to share the growing excitement to the conclusion.

Mrs. Olinsky has brought her 6th grade team to the Academic Bowl Championships, an unheard-of accomplishment, not only for their school, but also for their grade level. As each question is asked, she knows which one of her team will answer it and how they had come into the knowing.

At this point, the 3rd person narrative shifts to the 1st person telling his or her own story, starting earlier, back when each of the four had started becoming interconnected with the others. At times the stories overlap; one’s relatives are related to another’s, this person’s father is another person’s dentist, etc. The final boy’s story to be told makes the magical connection, like a puzzle that is made stronger and finer by putting the last piece in.

You can start thinking this story is all about the kids, but we are given glimpses of Mrs. Olinsky’s feelings, her pride in the kids, her situation of becoming a recent paraplegic. Yes, this book is about the kids, it is in their voices after all. But adding depth to Mrs. Olinsky brings a layer of richness to the story.

I did find the word usage a little odd at times. I don’t know of any 6th grader who uses the word “prepubescent” to describe a peer. And the lack of contractions in their speech recalls Portis’s True Grit.

Throughout the book people ask the teacher, why these kids? Why didn’t she pick the academic stars of the school, the A honor roll? She gave good answers, but couldn’t find the words for the real truth of it. The answer, coming at the end of the book, is not as much a revelation to Mrs. Olinsky as it is a confirmation of what she had seen in all of them when she began to pick them.

Because this book doesn’t have a huge plot, after the first time I read it through, I enjoyed it and then promptly forgot most of it. I enjoyed it just as much re-reading it and hope I retain more of it this time!

1968 Honor- The Egypt Game

My children told me how much they liked a book called The Egypt Game, a Newbery Honor book, so I was pretty pleased when, just a few days later I found a copy for sale at Goodwill. The author, Zilpha Keatley Snyder has written several other books I have read, such as The Witches of Worm and The Headless Cupid.

Right away I recognized a commonality with Snyder’s other books—an annoying, somewhat unlikeable, but exciting young female protagonist. In The Egypt Game, young April Hall has been sent to her Grandmother’s to stay while her Hollywood mother pursues her career. April is not easy to like; she’s haughty and seems insensitive to the feelings of others while being touchy herself. But she is vulnerable inside and has to handle the feeling of rejection from her mother that she can no longer deny.

April does make some friends, Melanie, Marshall and Elizabeth, and draws them into a game she creates, the Egypt game. The back yard of an old man’s antique store becomes their secret land of Egypt, and they decorate it with the trappings, customs and religions of ancient Egypt. Elaborate rituals and play-acting dominate their imaginative game. But a neighborhood menace threatens to take away their Egypt game, which has come to mean so much to them.

While I did enjoy reading the book, because I could not identify with April, I was less than enthusiastic about it. She is the ringleader type, who tends to drag innocent friends and bystanders into trouble. She has no qualms about praying and bowing to the ancient gods, all part of her reality within the role-playing. I wonder how I would have felt about the book if I had read it when I was a kid. It did make me think about some of the imaginative games I used to play with my sisters and friends.

I appreciated the subtle and realistic way Snyder deals with changes April’s character, how she becomes a better friend and begins to appreciate her grandmother, but always remaining April.

I bought this book used for 25 cents at a Goodwill.