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osprey_archerOn a small island, near a large harbor, there once lived a fisherman's little daughter (named Samantha, but always called Sam), who had the reckless habit of lying.
Evaline Ness's Sam, Bangs, and Moonshine is totally charming. It's about a girl and her cat and her imaginary pet baby kangaroo and the rug by the door that she rides to the moon, and the difference between telling stories and straight-up lying, and also it is one of those stories where everything may be the magic of imagination or might possibly be real magic (can Bangs the cat talk or not?), for which I have always had a weakness.
(Also, shout-out to whoever wrote the front-cover copy for this book. Young readers whose mothers are mermaids, who own fierce lions and baby kangaroos, and can talk to their cats, will find a fast friend in the heroine of this imaginative, humorous book. Who wouldn't want to read that book? Who wouldn't want to start pretending their mother is a mermaid right then?)
I might have found this book a bit too emotionally stressful as a child, though. There is a scene where it appears that Bangs has washed away to sea, and while it turns out on the very next page that he is okay, I might have called a halt to the book right there.
Evaline Ness's Sam, Bangs, and Moonshine is totally charming. It's about a girl and her cat and her imaginary pet baby kangaroo and the rug by the door that she rides to the moon, and the difference between telling stories and straight-up lying, and also it is one of those stories where everything may be the magic of imagination or might possibly be real magic (can Bangs the cat talk or not?), for which I have always had a weakness.
(Also, shout-out to whoever wrote the front-cover copy for this book. Young readers whose mothers are mermaids, who own fierce lions and baby kangaroos, and can talk to their cats, will find a fast friend in the heroine of this imaginative, humorous book. Who wouldn't want to read that book? Who wouldn't want to start pretending their mother is a mermaid right then?)
I might have found this book a bit too emotionally stressful as a child, though. There is a scene where it appears that Bangs has washed away to sea, and while it turns out on the very next page that he is okay, I might have called a halt to the book right there.
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Date: 2017-01-02 04:56 pm (UTC)I think I might have had other problems with this story as a kid, but as an adult, I think I'd like its portrayal of Sam.
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Date: 2017-01-03 08:09 pm (UTC)I imagine as a child I would have been displeased by its portrayal of imagination as anything less than a 100% positive force, but as an adult I can see the point.
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Date: 2017-01-02 06:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-01-03 08:08 pm (UTC)