Wednesday Reading Meme
Dec. 27th, 2023 07:56 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerWhat I’ve Just Finished Reading
One more Newbery Honor book: Elizabeth Janet Gray’s Young Walter Scott, a novelized biography of the youth of Sir Walter Scott. Fascinating to get a glimpse of life in Edinburgh in the last decades of the 18th century - the ‘45 still cast a long shadow!
Also Vivien Alcock’s Stranger at the Window, which I would have LOVED if I had read it as a child, as it’s a book about a hidden child and I LOVED books about hidden children. (Why yes, I did obsess over Margaret Peterson Haddix’s Among the Hidden, in which families are required by law to stop at two children so third children have to be kept hidden. The rest of the series never lived up to the first book, IMO.)
In this book, young Leslie realizes that there is a child hiding in the attic of the house next door in London. Soon, she realizes that the neighbor children are hiding an illegal immigrant… whom they can no longer hide, as their mother has become suspicious, so Leslie has to hide him! Wonderful. A++. You know how in the sixth book of the Samantha series, Samantha hides her best friend Nellie and her two little sisters in the attic? This pushes all those buttons.
Given the premise, you might expect Stranger at the Window to delve into the whys and wherefores of illegal immigration more than it does. But goddammit, I’m not here to learn anything, I’m here for adventure.
Also Carol Ryrie Brink’s The Pink Motel. Just before Christmas, the Mellen family inherits a bright pink motel in Florida from Great-Uncle Hiram. They head down to put the place in order and sell it, only the children are instantly smitten and want to stay there forever on account of the quirky guests: an itinerant handyman who carved weather vanes for all the cottages at the motel, a gangster who cuts paper lace, and an artist from Greenwich Village who carries a possibly magical hamper (always full of whatever food you happen to need, including on one occasion Alligator Food).
Is Miss Ferris in fact magical? The book never commits to an answer on this question, but (a) that magical hamper, (b) she keeps saying things like “[shooting apples off people’s heads] is a nice trick that originated in Switzerland, I believe, a long time ago when I was just a girl,” and (c) she spins and weaves an entire theater curtain in less than a week.
The book sort of sits at the intersection of mid-century children’s fantasy and mid-century children’s books about family hijinks, so if you like either of those things you might like it. Carol Ryrie Brink is always a good time, in any case. (I bought this book cheap at a used bookstore and if anyone would like it, I would be happy to send it.)
What I’m Reading Now
Not much progress in Sir Isumbras at the Ford this week. Having returned young Anne-Hilarion to his grandfather in London, the Chevalier de la Vireville has landed once again on the coast of Brittany… only to realize that his foot is more badly injured than he realized, and he may not be able to climb the rocky cliffs off the beach!
What I Plan to Read Next
The library has another autobiography by another mid-century woman children’s writer that I like (Carol Ryrie Brink). I’ve learned my lesson from the debacle after I put a hold on L. M. Boston’s autobiography last week: I’m going to Central Library in person to pick Carol Ryrie Brink’s A Chain of Hands up myself in my hot little hands!
One more Newbery Honor book: Elizabeth Janet Gray’s Young Walter Scott, a novelized biography of the youth of Sir Walter Scott. Fascinating to get a glimpse of life in Edinburgh in the last decades of the 18th century - the ‘45 still cast a long shadow!
Also Vivien Alcock’s Stranger at the Window, which I would have LOVED if I had read it as a child, as it’s a book about a hidden child and I LOVED books about hidden children. (Why yes, I did obsess over Margaret Peterson Haddix’s Among the Hidden, in which families are required by law to stop at two children so third children have to be kept hidden. The rest of the series never lived up to the first book, IMO.)
In this book, young Leslie realizes that there is a child hiding in the attic of the house next door in London. Soon, she realizes that the neighbor children are hiding an illegal immigrant… whom they can no longer hide, as their mother has become suspicious, so Leslie has to hide him! Wonderful. A++. You know how in the sixth book of the Samantha series, Samantha hides her best friend Nellie and her two little sisters in the attic? This pushes all those buttons.
Given the premise, you might expect Stranger at the Window to delve into the whys and wherefores of illegal immigration more than it does. But goddammit, I’m not here to learn anything, I’m here for adventure.
Also Carol Ryrie Brink’s The Pink Motel. Just before Christmas, the Mellen family inherits a bright pink motel in Florida from Great-Uncle Hiram. They head down to put the place in order and sell it, only the children are instantly smitten and want to stay there forever on account of the quirky guests: an itinerant handyman who carved weather vanes for all the cottages at the motel, a gangster who cuts paper lace, and an artist from Greenwich Village who carries a possibly magical hamper (always full of whatever food you happen to need, including on one occasion Alligator Food).
Is Miss Ferris in fact magical? The book never commits to an answer on this question, but (a) that magical hamper, (b) she keeps saying things like “[shooting apples off people’s heads] is a nice trick that originated in Switzerland, I believe, a long time ago when I was just a girl,” and (c) she spins and weaves an entire theater curtain in less than a week.
The book sort of sits at the intersection of mid-century children’s fantasy and mid-century children’s books about family hijinks, so if you like either of those things you might like it. Carol Ryrie Brink is always a good time, in any case. (I bought this book cheap at a used bookstore and if anyone would like it, I would be happy to send it.)
What I’m Reading Now
Not much progress in Sir Isumbras at the Ford this week. Having returned young Anne-Hilarion to his grandfather in London, the Chevalier de la Vireville has landed once again on the coast of Brittany… only to realize that his foot is more badly injured than he realized, and he may not be able to climb the rocky cliffs off the beach!
What I Plan to Read Next
The library has another autobiography by another mid-century woman children’s writer that I like (Carol Ryrie Brink). I’ve learned my lesson from the debacle after I put a hold on L. M. Boston’s autobiography last week: I’m going to Central Library in person to pick Carol Ryrie Brink’s A Chain of Hands up myself in my hot little hands!
