Jacob Have I Loved: 1981 Newbery Award Winner

In March of 2014, I started a new undertaking: reading every single Newbery Medal Winner book. A number of them I have read in the past, but I am reading them with fresh eyes,and reviewing them for others. I am not reading them in order, as some will require some effort on my part to find them all. Want to keep track of which books I read? Check them out at Confessions of a Wannabe Reader!

I apologize for my long absence from blogging.  Summers are usually filled with other endeavors for me, and this summer was no different.  I barely read during summer since I lost my library card and my Kindle bit the dust, and I regret doing so, but now that the school year is upon us, I am trying to make up for lost time.  I have found my library card, but must wait to replace my Kindle.  Therefore, I will be reading only print books.  

Cover of the book - used for identification purposes only under the fair use clause

Sara Louise Bradshaw: Behind Her Sister's Shadow

"I kept wondering ever since you came.  Why would a woman like you, who could have anything she wanted, come to a place like this?  Now I understand."

Elder by just a few minutes, Sara Louise Bradshaw, nicknamed Wheeze, lives in the shadow of her more delicate sister Caroline.  Growing up with her family on small fictional Rass Island in Maryland's Chesapeake Bay during the turbulence of the Great Depression and World War Two, Louise feels robbed by her younger twin, who is gifted in music and is considered more feminine and beautiful.  Caroline steals Louise's name, her friends, her belongings, her family's affection, even her very hopes.  Louise longs to be a waterman like her father and prays to become a boy so she can escape her sister's personality.  What surprises her, however, is that her dreams and prayers do not sustain the woman she is becoming and that leaving the island of her birth may be the only way to finding herself.

I first read Jacob Have I Loved by Katherine Paterson as a seventh grader in my English class.  It was one of the books that shaped my childhood.  I could identify with Louise's struggle to find herself, as well as with the feeling over being overshadowed by others.  As the eldest child in my family, the idea that a younger sibling's personality could overshadow an elder one's was something I could relate to, as I often felt the same way with my younger siblings growing up.  Sibling rivalry was a big deal to me, as it was to Louise, and I could feel her frustrations.

As I read this book as an adult, I find that it still resonates with me.  Since this was written from an adult looking back on her childhood, it reads well enough for adults to enjoy it.  Like Louise, I have been able to look back at the journey to adulthood so far as one that was filled with trials, but also with tribulations.  She is confident as she looks back over the story that had she not have had her twin sister and her overshadowing personality, she may not have come into her own as an adult.

There is a religious aspect to this book.  The story gets its title from a verse in the Bible where God says "Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated."  Like the elder twin of Isaac, Louise feels unloved and unwanted as she compares herself to the favored, younger twin.  The story weaves itself around this tale of old, as Louise and Caroline's devout grandmother taunts the older girl with the verse.  It takes Louise years to feel wanted and loved again, and it is only when she releases herself that she feels this.

This book is a very well written story, and anyone who can remember what it felt like to be an outsider even in one's own home will probably enjoy this book.

Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry: 1977 Newbery Award Winner

The beginning of March 2014 I started a new undertaking: reading every single Newbery Medal Winner book. A number of them I have read in the past, but I am reading them with fresh eyes,and reviewing them for others. I am not reading them in order, as some will require some effort on my part to find them all.  Want to keep track of which books I read?  Check them out at Confessions of a Wannabe Reader!

Cover of the book - Used for illustration purposes only under the fair use clause

Cassie Logan: Wishing For Change

"Oh, P-Papa, d-does it have to be?' ......'All I can say, Cassie girl... is that it shouldn't be."

Nine-year-old Cassie Logan lives in on her family's farm in Mississippi with her parents, her grandmother and her three brothers.  They are unique in their community because they are the only black family in the town to own land.  That doesn't mean they aren't being affected by the Depression going on around them though, as the land is mortgaged and the family does not have enough to make ends meet.  There is also the fact that many of the whites in the area can't stand the "uppity" ways of the Logan family.  When a series of events threaten to destroy Cassie's preconceived notion of how her life is, Cassie must struggle to accept her place in society and the fact that her family isn't as special as she believes.

I had recently read Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred D. Taylor, as it was read by the sixth grade class at the school I work at as one of their English novels, and I had been subbing for one of the English teachers at that time.  It is a great work about the lives of sharecropping African Americans versus the whites that lived in the areas, and an accurate account of what happened to those who went against the norms of society.

Struggle is a theme of this book.  Cassie struggles to find her place in society, as she deals with the racism of white children and adults alike.  Her parents struggle to make the farm successful.  Her elder brother, Stacy, struggles to be friends with two boys in the community, one black named T.J. Avery and one white named Jeremy Simms.

This was a difficult book to read, but was also a good book to read.  Like Sounder, this book is written from the perspective of an African American child.  The racism and tragic events in this story were told from Cassie's perspective, which seemed to soften their harshness.  I did enjoy this book more than I had Sounder, though this was not one of my favorites from this project.  It is a book that will open a child's eyes to the horrors of racism.

A Year Down Yonder: 2001 Newbery Award Winner

The beginning of March 2014 I started a new undertaking: reading every single Newbery Medal Winner book. A number of them I have read in the past, but I am reading them with fresh eyes,and reviewing them for others. I am not reading them in order, as some will require some effort on my part to find them all.  Want to keep track of which books I read?  Check them out at Confessions of a Wannabe Reader!

Cover of the book - Used for illustration purposes only under the fair use clause

Sometimes I binge read and then remember to write up reviews on several books at once, or I write up reviews on sheets of paper and then have to find time to type them into the computer, so forgive the multiple posts today.

Mary Alice Dowdel: The City Gal

Mary Alice Dowdel used to spend just her summers at her grandmother's house in southern Illinois, but the year is 1937 and the Great Depression has hit her family hard.  Her parents are boarding in a single room, her brother is working out West, and the fifteen-year-old is sent to live with her grandmother for the entire year.  She is not happy with the prospect, as her grandmother lives in a very rural area that is very hick to the Chicago girl.  Her grandmother is tough as nails and very no nonsense, and Mary Alice dreads the prospect of living with her.  But that changes as Mary Alice gets to know her grandmother and warms up to some of the townsfolk.   She learns that maybe the year spent "down yonder" wasn't so bad.

I had read this story before and thoroughly enjoyed it when I read it.  A Year Down Yonder is the middle book of a trilogy by Richard Peck, who also wrote the book Strays Like Us (another book I really enjoyed reading).  It is the heartwarming tale of a teen who learns that her seemingly backwards grandmother isn't as backwards as she seems.  It is also a tale about coming home.  This book, which seems to be written for teenagers instead of children, is an awesome story of remembering a stage in childhood for a young woman.  Some of it reminded me of elements of the book Belle Prater's Boy, particularly the revealing of some of the townsfolk's secrets and the way that some of the hoity-toity elite of the town try to stay away from the country bumpkins.  It is a very good read.

Bud, Not Buddy: 2000 Newbery Award Winner

The beginning of March 2014 I started a new undertaking: reading every single Newbery Medal Winner book. A number of them I have read in the past, but I am reading them with fresh eyes,and reviewing them for others. I am not reading them in order, as some will require some effort on my part to find them all.  Want to keep track of which books I read?  Check them out at Confessions of a Wannabe Reader!

Cover of the book - The image is used for identification purposes only under the fair use clause.

Bud Caldwell: The Boy on the Lam

"Rules and Things Number 39: The Older You Get the Worse Something Has to Be to Make You Cry"

At the height of the Great Depression, orphaned Bud Caldwell is ten years old and has lived in a number of different foster homes.   At least he did until he picked a fight with a foster brother and ran away.  His mother died when he was 6, and he doesn't know anything about his father, save that he was a musician, perhaps the famous musician Herman Calloway.  His mother had several flyers of Herman's bands. Carrying everything he owns in a beat up suitcase that he has to close with a piece of rope, Bud decides to head 120 miles on foot to Grand Rapids, Michigan, which is where Herman Calloway lives.  Along the way, he discovers that the rules he has established in his young life ring true, and that family is something that is made by more than just the bonds of blood.

I have read Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis several times, and the short book is very touching.  Its a story of longing and belonging.  Bud longs for his lost mother.  Herman Calloway longs for his lost daughter.  It is also a story of growing up in a very trying time, as the Great Depression touched many lives in very hard ways. Children were forced to grow up faster and accept responsibilities for themselves even when they were not mature enough to do so.  Unlike other books I had read about the Great Depression, like Moon over Manifest and No Promises in the Wind by Irene Hunt , this one was unique in that it was told from the viewpoint of an African American child instead.

Just as the story of the Great Depression was not neatly resolved, the ending of this novel is not resolved in a neat and tidy ending, but one is left hoping that there are good things coming to Bud.

Sounder: 1970 Newbery Award Winner

The beginning of March 2014 I started a new undertaking: reading every single Newbery Medal Winner book.  A number of them I have read in the past, but I am reading them with fresh eyes,and reviewing them for others. I am not reading them in order, as some will require some effort on my part to find them all.  Want to keep track of which books I read?  Check them out at Confessions of a Wannabe Reader!

Cover of the book - The image is used for identification purposes only under the fair use clause.

Sounder: The Loyal Dog

Sounder by William H. Armstrong is a story about a sharecropping man, his son, and his wonderful hound dog Sounder.  When the man is arrested and taken away, Sounder tries to save him, resulting in his wounding.  But the dog lives, as  the result of careful tending by the son and his mother.  The son, only known as the boy, tries to find his father and find a way for his family to survive without the man of the house. 

This book depressed me, and I struggled to finish reading it.  As far as value as historical fiction goes, this was a great story of life as a poor Negro sharecropper.  There is much pain and suffering in this short novel, and while some of the characters seem content with their lot in life, it seemed harsh and saddening.  The only character named in the story is the dog, Sounder, who is named for the way his bark sounds through the woods.  

After reading some of the other Newbery Medal books lately and feeling uplifted at the end of the reading, I felt like I was kind of let down by Sounder.  While the boy does achieve his goals and there is a slight hopefulness to the end of the book, there also a feeling of injustice and discontent. 

Moon Over Manifest: 2011 Newbery Award

I have started a new undertaking: reading every single Newbery Medal Winner book.  A number of them I have read in the past, but I am reading them with fresh eyes,and reviewing them for others. I am not reading them in order, as some will require some effort on my part to find them all.

Cover of the book - The image is used for identification purposes only under the fair use clause.

Manifest: To Reveal or to Make Known

"If there is such a thing as a universal..... it's that there is power in a story."  

Twelve-year-old Abilene Tucker knows one thing for certain, even if everyone else doubts it; her father will return,at the end of summer to get her.  At the height of the Depression, Abilene is sent to the town of Manifest, Kansas to spend the summer with friends of her father.  She arrives in time for the last day of school and receives an assignment from the solitary schoolteacher: write a story.  Abilene spends the summer figuring out just what her story is, as well as finding out the story of the town of Manifest.  Throughout her journey, she learns that she is helping to heal a town, and that loving and being loved both leave scars.

I read Moon Over Manifest by Clare Vanderpool without knowing anything about either the book or the author.  Perhaps that was a good thing, because I did not have any notions about what I might be reading and were able to discover both the author's storytelling ability and the story itself..  The story spans two distinct times in American History, as it covers both the end of World War One and the Spanish influenza epidemic as well as the middle of the Great Depression, when people had given up hope.  Being a History buff, the stories that are woven through the main plot were fascinating and brought to life an era that is often times drab and dreary for me.

Needless to say, I thoroughly enjoyed this book, and was captivated until the end by the themes of hope and hopelessness, of belonging and loneliness, of the story.   Clare Vanderpool was able to tell a story that is universal.  Like Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, this story tells of heartbreak during the depression, but unlike the former, Moon Over Manifest was able to leave me feeling like something good is coming to the characters.  There is a power in this story.