Reading Through History: Park's Quest by Katherine Paterson (1988)

Park, whose full name is  Parkington Waddell Broughton the fifth, has never known his father, who died in the Vietnam war. His mother refuses to talk about Park the fourth at all, preferring to leave the past in the past even if it keeps her son in the dark. When Park continues to press for information after a visit to the Vietnam War Memorial, however, his mother finally agrees to let him spend some time with the Broughton family on their farm. Imagining himself as an Arthurian knight on a quest, Park is determined to make a good impression on his grandfather, but he soon realizes that the elderly man is unwell, and that his uncle, Frank, is married to a Vietnamese woman, a member of the very race Park blames for his father's death. Worse yet, Frank's wife has a daughter named Thanh, who seems very hostile to Park, and who he sees as competition for attention from his long-lost relatives. It is only after several days spent piecing together the past that Park begins to understand how he might fit into the family.

As much as I love Katherine Paterson, I have to admit that this book was a bit of a muddle at times. Paterson intersperses the action of the story with scenes from Park's imagination, and after the first few instances, it becomes tedious. Most of these moments seem identical in tone and content, and it is very easy to skip them and still comprehend the story. Had I been editing this book, I think I'd have taken most of those digressions out of it entirely.

I also think this book is predictable, at least for adults. The revelations Park uncovers about his dad are just the sort of thing I'd expect to discover in a novel set after the Vietnam War, and they are not at all original. There are also a lot of mature themes - divorce, an extramarital affair, issues of paternity - that seem to blindside the reader near the end of the book in a way that I think would have been jarring for me as a kid, and probably would be for my girls as well, even in a few years.

The last time I reviewed a Paterson book, I mentioned that my husband and I had both concluded that her books would always deserve four or five stars. I guess Park's Quest is the exception that proves that rule. It was a three-star read for me, and not one I'm particularly interested in revisiting any time soon.

Book Review: Three Children and Shakespeare by Anne Terry White (1938)

Three Children and Shakespeare is a novel of sorts, in which a mother and her three children read four of Shakespeare's plays: The Merchant of Venice, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Julius Caesar, and The Taming of the Shrew. The mother character provides context for each tale, and she explains various aspects of Shakespeare's life and times as they become pertinent to the plays they are reading. Interspersed with the original text of the plays is commentary from each of the three children as they raise questions, express opinions, and engage with each work.

This vintage book, published in 1938, is a true gem, and it is such a crime that it is out of print! There are many books out there to introduce children to stories from Shakespeare, but none that I have seen do such a wonderful job of explaining the plays in child-friendly terms without dumbing them down.  This book beautifully incorporates the language and meter of the original plays, but it also anticipates and addresses the questions and ideas child readers might raise in a way that feels authentic and encourages kids to feel invested in the stories. Even I, who had previously read three of the four plays, found that I was able to get into each story more easily with the support of Mother, whose enthusiasm for the plays and complete confidence that her children can appreciate them, takes away any barriers that might keep a reader away.

Though this book is over 80 years old now, there is very little to date it to its time period. Everything Mother teaches her children about Shakespeare is still fully relevant to his works today, and because most of the action is simply just reading and discussing the plays together, it easily transcends generations. I can't wait for my girls to be old enough to understand these plays - this book will be the perfect way to introduce Shakespeare for the first time!

Book Review: The Crossover by Kwame Alexander (2014)

Jordan and Josh Bell are twins who play basketball, following in the footsteps of their father who once played professionally. As basketball season gets underway, the two boys get into a variety of disagreements while at the same time arriving at the realization that their father might have a serious medical problem for which he is stubbornly refusing to seek treatment.

I listened to the audiobook version of this novel in verse, and it was definitely an enjoyable experience. I knew the story was sad, but somehow the poetry format combined with the audiobook narration made that manageable for me. Because this book is a Newbery winner, I was skeptical that it would actually be any good, but the writing did turn out to be engaging and distinctive. Alexander writes everything well: the sports scenes, the dialogue of middle school boys, the family dynamics, Jordan's relationshp with his girlfriend, and the sibling relationship between the twins. Every aspect of the book is appealing, and there is something for everyone to relate to, even readers who aren't big on sports. (In that way, it reminded me a lot of Jason Reynolds's Track series.)

Corey Allen does a great job reading this for the audiobook. Days later, I can still hear his voice in my head as I think back over the story. I would definitely listen to more books narrated by him. I'm also already planning my next Kwame Alexander read, which I think is going to be Booked.

Book Review: Sweeping Up the Heart by Kevin Henkes (2019)

Amelia and her new friend Casey are both struggling to enjoy their spring vacations due to family strife. For Casey, who is visiting his aunt, the problem is his parents' impending divorce, to which he vehemently objects with a variety of tactics, including homemade anti-divorce tee shirts. For Amelia, the superficial problem is that her father, the Professor, wouldn't take her to Florida for Spring Break, but this complaint masks Amelia's overall unhappiness with her father's standoffish demeanor, and her wish for a more permanent mother figure than her babysitter, Mrs. O'Brien. One day, Casey sees a woman on the street and creates an imaginary backstory in which this stranger is Amelia's mother. Though Amelia knows her mother died when she was young, she still entertains the idea that perhaps there is a connection to this unknown woman. When the woman's identity is revealed, however, Amelia is not sure she is prepared to handle this new knowledge.

Like most novels by Kevin Henkes, this one is very quiet, with a melancholy and introspective mood. This story is very heavy with feelings of longing and disappointment, and though it is a short book, it doesn't seem to go by very quickly because it so laden down with these issues. The writing is quite nice, with simple turns of phrase that read a bit like poetry, but at the same time, very little actually happens which will certainly turn off more action-oriented middle grade readers.

I'm really puzzled as to why this book has to be set in 1999. Aside from a few brief references to Y2K, there is nothing about the time period that really impacts the story. It is true that the characters don't have smart phones, which would certainly have changed the way Amelia researches her mother, but I'm not sure that is enough of a reason to set the story 20 years in the past.  

I liked this book well enough, but it's clearly not the most memorable middle grade novel I'll read in 2019. Personally, if I'm going to recommend a book about a father and daughter dealing with the loss of a wife and mother, it's going to be Remembering Mrs. Rossi by Amy Hest, and its sequel, Letters to Leo, which deal with many of the same issues as Sweeping Up the Heart, but with a slightly brighter outlook overall.  

Fumbling Through Fantasy: Miss Hickory by Carolyn Sherwin Bailey (1946)

Miss Hickory is a small doll, made of twigs and a strong hickory nut. She has lived, up until now, in a corncob house near the Old Place, the house in New Hampshire where Ann, the little girl who made her, lives. When Ann goes away to school, however, it becomes clear that Miss Hickory will not be spending the winter inside on the windowsill as she has done in years past, and she sets out to find a new home. With the help of such friends as Crow and a cat named Mr T. Willard-Brown, she begins to explore new lodgings, and by extension, the larger world around her, resulting in a variety of adventures.

In a word, I would describe this 1947 Newbery Medal winner as charming. I read it aloud to my five-year-old and three-year-old together, and they loved the animal characters and the involvement of the natural world in the story. They were captivated by the beautiful description of the way the animals commemorate Christmas and they enjoyed the different personalities of the animals Miss Hickory meets.

There is some death and sadness in the book, but my girls were completely fine with it. (I'm about to vaguely spoil a couple of things, so skip the rest of this paragraph if you don't want to know!) A deer loses his mother to hunters at one point, but the death is handled subtly, and none of us shed any tears. (It was not a dramatic Disney parent death a la Bambi or The Lion King.) The deer also gets an immediate happy ending, so the sadness only lasts for one chapter. My daughters were equally unbothered by Miss Hickory's "death" near the end of the book, which is clearly more of a transition than a true loss of life, since Miss Hickory is always understood to be a toy, not a human being. I have read some Goodreads reviews that really condemn this book because of the ending, but personally, I found it refreshing that the author didn't shy away from what strikes me as a very logical ending for one whose head is a nut.

This read-aloud was also noteworthy because I experimented with doing voices for some of the characters. I did voices for Crow, Hen-Pheasant, and Squirrel, and used my own "story time voice" from my library days as the voice of Miss Hickory. The girls seemed a little taken aback at first because I typically don't do voices, but they seemed to enjoy the change of pace.

I did wish some of the chapters had clearer transitions between them, as the narrative does jump around quite a bit between different animals and sometimes it took almost an entire chapter to figure out how an episode connected to the overall novel. I also found myself wishing for more references to the human beings in Ann's family, but that is probably because of my own preference for stories set in the real world, and not necessarily because the book needed more of such scenes.

I'm not sure every preschooler would react as casually as mine did to some of the events in this book, but if you have kids who have been exposed to a wide variety of stories, including fairy tales where deaths occur, and they're not especially sensitive to sad topics, I wouldn't assume this book is too much for them. It's a fantasy story set in what could very well be any child's backyard and it feeds the imagination with ideas of what might be happening while we humans are going about our mundane daily activities.

I'll be curious to see how this compares to Hitty: Her First Hundred Years by Rachel Field, another Newbery winning doll story which I've just started reading to my five-year-old.

5 Reasons I Listen to Audiobooks at Double Speed

Photo by Findaway Voices on Unsplash

I have listened to audiobooks on and off over the past several years, but it has only been since last spring that I have become a truly avid listener. What really got me hooked was the discovery that I could speed up the narration of the books I listen to. I know listening at double speed sounds like a crazy thing to do, but here, for Top Ten Tuesday's audio freebie topic, are some of the reasons why it works for me:

I'm a fast reader. Because I read quickly, I don't have the patience to listen to a narrator read slowly. For me to feel like listening to an audiobook is worthwhile, I generally don't want it to take much more time than reading the physical book would take. While most narrators still read more slowly at double speed than I do on my own, the gap in speed is a lot smaller when I accelerate the narration.

My mind doesn't get a chance to wander. When audiobooks play at normal speed, I have a tendency to tune out what I'm hearing and let my mind drift to other things. When I play a book at double speed, however, there are no real pauses or gaps where I have the opportunity to get distracted by my to-do list, or by a random memory from high school, or by whatever wants to pop into my head. The words go by so quickly that I have to listen closely to be able to follow the story.

The books go by faster. The apps I use to listen to audiobooks show either how much time is left in the book or how much time is left in the current chapter. When I listen at double speed, the full time is still displayed, but the seconds tick by twice as fast. Being able to mentally cut that time remaining in half really makes it feel like the story is flying by, and I'm accomplishing a lot of reading, which is especially helpful when a book is really long or otherwise intimidating.

The narration sounds more normal. Audiobook narrators tend to speak very slowly, to the point that the pace sounds unnatural. Most of the time, at double speed, the narration is maybe just a little bit quicker than normal speech. Occasionally, if a narrator is a bit of a faster talker, I'll have to scale it back to 1.75 or 1.5 to keep the speech from becoming garbles, but most of the time 2x is the sweet spot for me. 

I can listen to a lot in limited time. Most of the audiobooks I listen to are not appropriate for my kids to hear (murder mysteries, romances, etc.) so I have to squeeze those books into my daily walk and times when the girls are asleep. If I have an hour to listen, speeding up the narration to 2x makes it possible to get two hours of a book done in that time. This is especially nice when my library only has an audiobook edition of a title and I can't just switch over to an ebook or paperback when the kids are around.

I know lots of readers have strong opinions about speeding up audiobooks. Where do you stand? What speed do you prefer?

#YearOfHarryPotter: Prisoner of Azkaban, Chapters 8-11

Once again, this week it was difficult to tear myself away from this book after I'd finished reading the week's assignment, which was chapters 8 to 11: "Flight of the Fat Lady," "Grim Defeat," "The Marauder's Map," and "The Firebolt." (Lots of spoilers in this post, for this book and later ones.)

One of my favorite things about this book is that it begins to introduce all of the backstory leading up to the death of Harry's parents and the key figures in Harry's life who are later revealed to be members of the Order of the Phoenix. I think the relationship between past and present is one of the strongest elements in this series, and this book feels like the beginning of the real story Rowling wants to tell.

I was especially drawn into the relationship between Lupin and Snape. Having read to the end of the series, I have such love and empathy for Snape, but his behavior when he must cover Lupin's class due to "illness" is pretty cruel. Even if he disapproves of a werewolf teaching at Hogwarts, it seems really over-the-top to discuss werewolves with Lupin's class, almost as though he is encouraging them to figure out the truth about their teacher's illness. I guess some of this is due to the fact that Snape suspects Lupin of helping Sirius Black, who Snape believes betrayed his beloved Lily, but sometimes it is just hard to reconcile the Snape of book 7 with the Snape of the earlier books.

As for Harry's overhearing that Sirius Black is his godfather, I found that whole scene kind of far-fetched this time around. Knowing that that bombshell was coming allowed me to focus my attention on how the information is delivered, and it didn't quite ring true. It doesn't seem consistent that McGonagall would be discussing sensitive information like that in public on a day when she knows the students are in Hogsmeade. Even if Harry himself is not meant to be present, Ron and Hermione and plenty of other Gryffindors (not to mention nosy Slytherins!) are around to overhear. This is the only time in the series so far, where I feel like Rowling inserted a scene solely for the opportunity to give us a bunch of exposition at one time.

The other thing of which I took special note is Hermione's reporting to McGonagall that Harry received a Firebolt from an anonymous benefactor on Christmas. I've really been on the lookout for instances when these characters do dangerous things and get away with it, but Hermione really does the right thing in this situation, even though Harry is very annoyed with her. As Dumbledore says in the first book, "It takes a great deal of bravery to stand up to our enemies, but just as much to stand up to our friends.” Hermione's willingness to go against Harry's wishes in order to protect him is admirable, and her good instincts are the kind of thing I won't mind seeing my kids emulate.

Reading Through History: The Porcupine Year by Louise Erdrich (2008)

In the year during which Omakayas is twelve winters old, she and her family leave their home near Lake Superior and head west, looking for a new place to settle. As they make the difficult journey, Omakayas and her younger brother, Pinch, both begin to come of age, taking on new names and identities as adulthood comes ever closer. The year is marked by many emotional ups and downs, including the loss of a beloved family member and the revelation that another is perhaps not what he had first seemed.

I was really annoyed by the representation of Father Baraga in the second book of this series, Game of Silence, and it took me a while to want to read another book for fear there would be more blatant inaccuracies requiring research and emails to Catholic Answers apologists. Happily, there are no egregiously anti-Catholic representations in this book, and indeed, priests, when mentioned, are shown to be helpful and merciful. Without having to dissect scenes involving Catholic clergy, I was able to enjoy this novel for what it is: an exciting but emotional adventure story about Ojibwe life in 1852.

There is a lot of memorable description in this book, and while not all of it is pleasant to read about, it is all handled very tastefully and almost poetically. Though there are some definite scary moments, and some that could even be considered gruesome, I did not find them so troubling that I lost sleep or had nightmares or anything like that. Even the scenes about Omakayas beginning her "moon" and gaining the ability to bear children were written in a way that didn't feel embarrassing or awkward. Erdrich describes this experience as such a positive and meaningful transition from girlhood to womanhood, and though it is very specific to Omakayas's culture, I think her description could be comforting to a girl from any time and place.

While the plot in this book is pretty action-packed, for some reason, I just didn't connect with it as strongly as with the first book of the series. Still, I enjoyed the story and plan to read the next book, Chickadee, sometime this spring, at which point I'll need to get myself a copy of Makoons, the only one of the series I don't yet own, and the final book.

Book Review: Hello, Universe by Erin Entrada Kelly (2017)

Shy Virgil, age eleven, is having trouble learning his multiplication tables, so he goes to the resource room at his school every Thursday. Every week, he sees Valencia, a fellow student who is deaf and wears hearing aids. He is interested in getting to know Valencia better, but he's not sure how to approach her. He decides to enlist his friend Kaori Tanaka, who claims to be a psychic, to help him figure out what to do. Before he can fully take advantage of her services, however, a bully attacks him, and he and his guinea pig, Gulliver, end up trapped in a well. Now Virgil is convinced that not only will he never speak to Valencia, but he might never even be found.

After being let down by the 2019 Newbery winner, Merci Suarez Changes Gears, I became curious about the 2018 medal winner. Sadly, Hello, Universe seems to suffer from the same strains of mediocrity that made Merci Suarez Changes Gears such a disappointment. As I read, I imagined a diversity checklist, and with the introduction of each new character, I checked another box. It feels as though the author tried to ensure that her book would be as inclusive as possible by including as much diversity as possible, whether it contributed to the story or not. Because there are so many main characters, none of them are as well-developed as they could be, and they all feel like token representations of their minority groups rather than three-dimensional characters.

These characters are also presented as victims - of clueless parents, unbelievably stereotypical bullies, and general misunderstanding about their identities. The portrayal of bullies is especially bothersome, as both Virgil's bully, Chet, and Valencia's former best friend, Roberta sound like stock characters from a 1990s teen drama. Chet uses the words "retardo" and "pansy" which I don't think I've ever heard in real life. Every bully I've ever encountered has had subtler material. This book also perpetuates the stereotype that kids like Chet get their attitudes from their fathers. The story needs a villain, but Chet and his dad are both too cartoonish to feel like real threats. Roberta and the group of girls who ask Valencia not to hang out with them anymore are also not believable tormentors; their dialogue sounds like it was lifted from an after-school special. Any kid who has been bullied will recognize that this book does not understand how it feels.

Additionally, this book presents some problematic religious practices that would prevent me from recommending it to a Catholic family. Kaori relies on crystals and horoscopes to supposedly predict the future. Virgil talks to a mythical character when he is trapped in the well who talks about writing letters to the universe. Valencia prays to a saint, not for intercession, but seemingly as a form of worship. In that sense the book shares the same relativistic point of view as the 2017 Newbery Honor book, The Inquisitor's Tale, but at least it doesn't pretend to do anything else.

Each time I read a recent Newbery book, either a medal winner or an honor book, I become more convinced that this award can no longer be trusted to recognize books for their literary merit. This book is not distinctive, nor do I see what it might contribute to the canon of children's literature over a period of more than five years. All it does well is that it includes diversity, and that's a quality that serves a political agenda, not a literary one. From the start, the book feels laden down by all the pandering it does to the so-called "diversity Jedi," and even at its best moments, it still feels like it's trying too hard. Valencia is the strongest character, and I think telling just her story would have made for a better and more cohesive novel. The attempt to be all things to everyone really impacts the overall quality of the story in a negative way.

Hello, Universe is eminently forgettable. Newbery winner or not, no one is missing anything by not reading this book. If you're looking for a book about the interconnectedness of different people, and the uncanny ways in which important friendships sometimes form, Criss Cross by Lynne Rae Perkins, the 2006 Newbery Medal winner, is a much better choice. Goodbye, Stranger by Rebecca Stead (2015) is another good alternative. And if you really want to read about what it's like to be trapped in a well, there's a better book for that too: The Girl in the Well is Me by Karen Rivers, published in 2016.

Fumbling Through Fantasy: The Night Watchmen by Helen Cresswell (1969)

Henry, who has recently been bedridden with an illness, is finally allowed to get out of bed and spend time outdoors while he waits to be cleared to return to school. As he wanders the city on his first day of freedom, he encounters two unusual men - Josh and Caleb. At first glance, they appear to be mere tramps, but after spending time with them, hearing them talk about "There" and "Them" and a mysterious night train that can take them away if necessary, Henry begins to realize there is something unusual, and possibly otherworldly, about them.

This was a strange little book, and I'm not sure whether I enjoyed it. It was certainly intriguing, but it was so short, that by the time I felt invested in what was happening, the story was over. While I usually like compact middle grade novels, this one felt like the beginning of a larger story that never came to fruition. What is here is well-written, and it blurs the lines between reality and fantasy beautifully, but I didn't finish the book with the sense of satisfaction I was expecting.

This book could be a good choice for a reader who is wary of fantasy books, as the magical elements are ambiguous, and the setting is the real world. It might also make a good read-alike for a book like Skellig, which also involves a mysterious otherworldly visitor, or even The Dark is Rising, where fantastical events occur within the context of regular daily life. 

#YearofHarryPotter: Prisoner of Azkaban, Chapters 4-7

This week, for the first time since beginning this project, I wanted to keep reading when I finished the week's "assignment", which was Chapter 4 ("The Leaky Cauldron"), Chapter 5 ("The Dementor"), Chapter 6 ("Talons and Tea Leaves"), and Chapter 7 ("The Boggart in the Wardrobe"). There were so many things I loved in these four chapters (and some of them are spoiler-y):

• The humor: the banter among the Weasleys at the Leaky Cauldron before they and Harry leave for Hogwarts, imagining Boggart-Snape dressed in Neville's grandmother's clothes, and Professor Trelawney's outlandish behavior in Harry and Ron's first Divination class (plus McGonagall's reaction to it). I don't know why I don't usually think of this series as funny; there have been quite a few laugh-out-loud moments so far in these re-reads.
• The introduction of Remus Lupin. He's my favorite of all the Defense Against the Dark Arts teachers, and I love that his first interaction with Harry is to give him chocolate after the Dementor attack.
• Hagrid as the instructor for the Care of Magical Creatures class. I'd forgotten that he hadn't started out in this position, and I loved the way Harry, Ron, and Hermione tried to help him succeed in his first class, even when Malfoy was determined to make a fool of him.
• The hints that Hermione is using the time-turner. Though we don't find out until later in the book that Hermione is using time travel to make her intense courseload possible, all the clues are there from the start, and they fly just far enough under the radar to keep the mystery afloat. 
• Scabbers's odd behavior, which re-readers will know instantly is because he is really Peter Pettigrew, and he is reacting to the possibility of encountering escaped prisoner Sirius Black. 

So far, of the first three books, this seems like the one that is the most rewarding to re-read. I'm excited for the next set of chapters, which will introduce the Marauder's Map and explain what a Patronus is for the first time.

Book Review: A Girl from Yamhill by Beverly Cleary (1988)

A Girl from Yamhill is the first of two memoirs children's author Beverly Cleary wrote about her early life. It was my nonfiction pick for #MiddleGradeMarch over on Instagram. Interestingly though, after reading it, I'm questioning whether it's middle grade after all! Compared with her humorous tales of everyday life with Henry, Beezus, and Ramona on Klickitat Street, Cleary's childhood during the Great Depression is darker and sadder. There is still humor, of course, but her memoir is more realistic than idealistic in its worldview. Despite subject headings on the copyright page labeling it "juvenile nonfiction" it's as though the memoir is really written for those who loved her fiction books as kids to read once they've grown up.

The most fascinating thing for me was learning how many of the events and relationships in Cleary's novels were drawn from real life experiences. Though Cleary rarely comes out and states how a real life event influenced a fictional one, many of the connections are very obvious. I also found it interesting that Cleary had neither the supportive, loving mother nor the exasperating older sister which appear in the Ramona books.

I would definitely exercise caution in sharing this book with kids under 12. There are quite a few topics covered that require a bit or maturity to handle, including a miscarriage, an uncle who makes sexual advances, and a much older boyfriend whose unsettling presence is encouraged by Cleary's mother. Beverly Clearly handles these things tastefully, but she also doesn't shy away from the truth of the impact of these events on her well-being.

For me, though, this was a clear five-star read. I'm eagerly anticipating reading the follow-up memoir, My Own Two Feet (1995).

#YearOfHarryPotter: Prisoner of Azkaban, Chapters 1-3

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban was my favorite of the first three books the first time I read them, and it's also one of my favorites of the movie adaptations from the series. This week, I jumped in with chapters 1-3: "Owl Post," "Aunt Marge's Big Mistake," and "The Knight Bus." (Spoilers below.)

Ron starts the book with a couple of memorable moments. First, he tries to call Harry on the regular Muggle telephone and angers Uncle Vernon by shouting into his ear. Then, he sends Harry an owl which closes with my new favorite quote: "Don't let the Muggles get you down." (Is this quoted a lot? I feel like I have never seen it, but it should be on a tee shirt!) I'm really glad his character is holding up so well to these re-readings.

Because Harry is entering his third year at Hogwarts, he has now come up against the problem of needing a permission form signed to be allowed to visit Hogsmeade. Of course, after Harry blows up Aunt Marge, the Dursleys won't sign, and Cornelius Fudge, Minister of Magic, won't do it either. In my fuzzy memories of this predicament, I was under the impression that Fudge was standing on ceremony and somehow upholding the Dursleys' authority, but after this reading, it's clear that his inability to get the form signed is giving Harry an added layer of protection that Fudge wants him to have, as Sirius Black has escaped from Azkaban and everyone thinks he's dangerous at this point in the story. 

The other thing about Fudge that is notable is that he doesn't punish Harry for using magic on Aunt Marge, even when Harry is certain he is about to be expelled. Fudge seems to be motivated by relief in finding Harry safe as well as by his own affection for the wizarding world's young celebrity. I don't think it would have been right to expel Harry, necessarily, with a murderer on the loose, since Hogwarts is the safest place for him, but Fudge's leniency does add to the pile of evidence showing that Harry never faces the consequences of his actions. 

Finally, this section introduced one of my favorite things in the wizarding world: the Knight Bus. This was the scene I most wanted to see when the movie came out, and having just watched the clip on YouTube, I can say that the filmmakers really did a nice job bringing Rowling's description accurately to life, even if the dialogue was a bit condensed for time.

I'm looking forward to refreshing my memory about other favorite scenes as I read through this book over the next 5 weeks!

Read-at-Home Mom Report: February 2019

I took on a lot more reading this past month than I did in January, but I did still manage to review every book I read. I ended up finishing 40 books, including 15 picture books (most of which were read-alouds with my daughters.) I am heading into March three books ahead on my Goodreads challenge, so I'm going to keep that number set at 400 for the time being. Here's what I read in February. 

Books Read

Pay Attention, Carter Jones

by Gary D. Schmidt

Format: Digital ARC

Genre: Realistic fiction (middle grade)

Source: Edelweiss+

Review: On the blog (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐)

Merci Suárez Changes Gears

by Meg Medina 

Format: Ebook 

Genre: Realistic fiction (middle grade)

Source: Public library (Libby app)

Review: On the blog (⭐⭐⭐)

Best Babysitters Ever

by Caroline Cala

Format: Digital ARC

Genre: Realistic fiction (middle grade)

Source: Edelweiss+

Review: On Goodreads (⭐⭐)

Death of a Mad Hatter

by Jenn McKinlay

Format: Audiobook

Genre: Cozy mystery 

Source: Public library (Hoopla app)

Review: On Goodreads  (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

Buffalo West Wing

by Julie Hyzy

Format: Paperback

Genre: Cozy mystery

Source: Personal collection

Review: On Goodreads (⭐⭐⭐)

Flip-Flop Girl

by Katherine Paterson

Format: Hardcover

Genre: Realistic fiction (middle grade)

Source: Personal collection

Review: On the blog (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

A Trick of the Light

by Louise Penny
Format: Ebook/Audiobook
Genre: Mystery
Source: Public Library (Cloud Library / RB Digital apps)
Review: On Goodreads (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (re-read)

by C.S. Lewis
Format: Hardcover
Genre: Fantasy (middle grade)
Source: Personal collection
Review: On Goodreads (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐)

The Great Divorce

by C.S. Lewis
Format: Paperback
Genre: Fantasy
Source: Personal collection
Review: On Goodreads (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐)

The Coloring Crook

by Krista Davis
Format: Paperback
Genre: Cozy mystery
Source: Christmas gift
Review: On Goodreads (⭐⭐⭐)

A Family of Readers: The Book Lover's Guide to Children's and Young Adult Literature

edited by Roger Sutton and Martha V. Parravano
Format: Paperback
Genre: Nonfiction
Source: Personal collection
Review: On the blog (⭐⭐⭐)

Baby Monkey, Private Eye

by Brian Selznick and David Serlin
Format: Ebook
Genre: Fantasy (easy reader/early chapter book)
Source: Public library (Libby app)
Review: On Goodreads (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

Past Due for Murder

by Victoria Gilbert
Format: Digital ARC
Genre: Cozy Mystery
Source: Netgalley
Review: On Goodreads (⭐⭐⭐)

Baby Island

by Carol Ryrie Brink
Format: Hardcover
Genre: Realistic fiction (middle grade)
Source: Personal collection
Review: On the blog (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐)

Greenglass House (re-read)

by Kate Milford
Format: Audiobook
Genre: Fantasy (middle grade)
Source: Public library (RB Digital app)
Review: On Goodreads (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐)

The Best of Enemies

by Nancy Bond
Format: Hardcover
Genre: Realistic fiction (middle grade)
Source: Personal collection
Review: On the blog (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

The Summer I Turned Pretty

by Jenny Han
Format: Audiobook
Genre: Realistic fiction (young adult)
Source: Public library (RB Digital app)
Review: On Goodreads (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐)

The Borrowers

by Mary Norton
Format: Audiobook
Genre: Fantasy (middle grade)
Source: Public library
Review: On the blog (⭐⭐⭐)

The Memorial Hall Murder

by Jane Langton
Format: Paperback
Genre: Mystery
Source: Personal collection
Review: On Goodreads (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

The Enchanted Hour: The Miraculous Power of Reading Aloud in the Age of Distraction

by Meghan Cox Gurdon
Format: Hardcover
Genre: Nonfiction
Source: Public library
Review: On Goodreads (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

It's Not Summer Without You

by Jenny Han

Format: Audiobook

Genre: Realistic fiction (young adult)

Source: Public library (RB Digital app)

Review: On Goodreads (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

Fame, Fate, and the First Kiss

by Kasie West
Format: Digital ARC
Genre: Romance (young adult)
Source: Edelweiss+
Review: On Goodreads (⭐⭐)

The Nickel-Plated Beauty

by Patricia Beatty
Format: Hardcover
Genre: Historical fiction (middle grade)
Source: Personal collection
Review: On the blog (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (re-read)

by J.K. Rowling
Format: Hardcover

Genre: Fantasy (middle grade)

Source: Personal collection

Review: See my #YearofHarryPotter posts (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐)

We'll Always Have Summer

by Jenny Han
Format: Audiobook
Genre: Romance
Source: Public library (RB Digital App)
Review: On Goodreads (⭐⭐⭐)

Picture Books (with links to Goodreads reviews):

• Red Sky at Night by Elly MacKay
• What's It Like to be a Fish? by Wendy Pfeffer
• Do You Have the Time, Lydia? by Evaline Ness
• About Fish: A Guide for Children by Cathryn Sill
• Rosa-Too-Little by Sue Felt Kerr
• The Whole Wide World and Me by Toni Yuly
• Stardust by Jeanne Willis, illustrated by Briony May Smith
• Click, Clack, Moo I Love You! by Doreen Cronin, illustrated by Betsy Lewin
• Books! Books! Books!:  Explore the Amazing Collection of the British Library by Mick Manning and Brita Granström
• John Brown: His Fight for Freedom by John Hendrix 
• La Fiesta by Sesyle Joslin, illustrated by Steve Alcorn
• Pinkety Pinkety: A Practical Guide to Wishing by Sesyle Joslin, illustrated by Luciana Roselli
• Love Songs of the Little Bear by Margaret Wise Brown, illustrated by Susan Jeffers
• Handsigns by Kathleen Fain
• They Lived Like This in the Old Stone Age by Marie Neurath

Blog Posts Published: 

• My Favorite Literary Couples
• Read-at-Home Kids Report: February 2019

Read-a-thons, etc.

I participated in these challenges on Instagram in February: 

• #ReadWhatYouOwn February, for which I read four books that I had owned for 6 months or more.
• The Talk Wordy to Me Reading Challenge, during which I read from a physical book for 20 minutes per day for six days.
• #TheCSLewisProject, for which I counted both The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe and The Great Divorce.
• #OldSchoolKidlit2019, which I host, and for which I counted Baby Island. 

Challenge Progress

• Alphabet Soup: 5 read in February, 18 of 26 read total 
• Alphabet Soup Author Edition: 4 read in February, 15 of 26 read total
• #CathLit: 1 read in February, 4 of 19 read total 
• Cloak and Dagger: 7 read in February, 16 of 55 read total 
• Craving for Cozies: 6 read in February, 11 of 51 read total
• Library Love: 9 read in February, 16 of 60 read total 
• Mount TBR: 5 read in February, 15 of 36 read total 
• RMFAO Audiobooks: 7 read in 15, 15 of 25 read total  
• Goodreads goal: 40 read in February, 27 of 400 read total 

I'll be linking up this post with Feed Your Fiction Addiction for the February 2019 Wrap-Up Round-Up and with Unleashing Readers/Teach Mentor Texts and The Book Date for this week's edition of It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

#YearofHarryPotter: Chamber of Secrets, Chapters 14-18

With the last five chapters ("Cornelius Fudge," "Aragog," "The Chamber of Secrets," "The Heir of Slytherin" and "Dobby's Reward"), I have finished Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets!

Most of this section of the book was exactly as I remembered it, but it was still enjoyable to follow Harry through the final events of this second installment, including seeing Hermione petrified, paying a visit to Aragog, and most importantly, making the connection that Tom Riddle is actually Lord Voldemort.  (I had forgotten that this was not common knowledge prior to the events of this book.) As with last week's segment of the book, the ending did seem to go by much more quickly than it did the first time around, but that is probably at least in part because I knew what was going to happen.

Next week, I'll be jumping into book three, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Of the first three books, I always think of this one as my favorite, because of the way it plays with time, so I'm looking forward to discovering whether that is still true.

Reading Through History: The Nickel-Plated Beauty by Patricia Beatty (1964)

In 1886, in Washington Territory, Hester Kimball's mother is in need of a new stove. Hester's brother, Whitney, who works for the storekeeper, Mr. Willard, orders her one (the "Nickel-Plated Beauty") from the Montgomery Ward catalog without consulting his boss, but is bewildered when the item arrives and it turns out that "C.O.D." means he and his siblings will need to pay Mr. Willard for the stove, and for storage, too, before they can bring it home. Aiming to be able to afford the stove by Christmas, Hester and Whit and their five siblings secretly begin to take on extra jobs to earn the money to pay their debt. With the support of each other and their kind, but firm, schoolteacher the Kimball kids demonstrate the value of setting and achieving a goal and work to overcome the various obstacles that would keep them from giving their mother this gift.

I tend to enjoy books about everyday life, and my favorite historical fiction novels are typically the ones that give readers a taste of what it was like to live as an ordinary person in a certain time and place. This gentle, humorous middle grade novel does just that, and it is a quick and amusing read.  The Kimball kids' relationship to each other is mostly very sweet, and their desire to do something kind for their mother comes across in everything they do. The plot also lends itself to opportunities to understand the music that was popular at square dances, to witness some 1880s medical care, and to appreciate the geography of the coastal area in which the Kimballs live and its implications on how people lived their lives.

Really only one thing gave me pause. There is an odd subplot involving the children's aunt and uncle, who separate for a time owing to Aunt Rose's domineering personality. Hester inserts herself into that situation, and into at least one more romantic relationship between adults in a way that didn't really ring true for me, and also seemed kind of inappropriate. I'm not sure what the point of it really was, except that it gave Hester something to focus on between chances to earn money.  For what it's worth, Hester does also seem to learn that her actions have not been appropriate (but only after she has seen her efforts pay off, of course.)

In any case, this is a strong historical fiction title that helps kids to see how childhood is similar across generations and geography. The Kimballs feel real and relatable, and because of that, the historical context becomes more interesting by virtue of the reader's warm feelings toward the characters. I'll gladly have my girls read it around ages 8-10.

Book Review: The Best of Enemies by Nancy Bond (1978)

The youngest sibling in her family by quite a few years, twelve-year-old Charlotte Paige, also called Charlie, often feels left out of the lives of her brothers and sister, all of whom are adults with concerns very different from her own. She is, however, looking forward to the annual Patriots' Day celebration in her hometown of Concord, Massachusetts, which promises to be an exciting event in the midst of her otherwise boring spring vacation. As it turns out, the days leading up to Patriots' Day prove to be even more exciting than Charlie expects when she begins to see unusual people hanging around town, dressed in period costumes and speaking with foreign accents. Commodore Shattuck and his grandson, Oliver, seem to know exactly why the strangers have appeared, and before long, Charlotte becomes involved with them in a somewhat absurd reenactment of historical events.

My husband recommended this book to me after I read We Alcotts and announced that I wanted to read more about Concord. Though there weren't that many references to the Alcotts and their contemporaries in this book, there were some, and I enjoyed visiting Concord during the twentieth century while also looking back on events from the eighteenth century. As a kid, I didn't really feel connected to historical fiction, and this book alleviates that problem for readers like I was by weaving facts about true historical events into a contemporary coming-of-age story. Charlie is a likable and believable adolescent girl, and the warmth of her family and the personalities of each of her siblings come across very strongly. I also like the fact that the author reveals what is actually happening in Concord very slowly, giving the reader the chance to observe and form theories before simply explaining the role of the mysterious visitors. This adds a layer of depth and sophistication to the novel that I think is especially appealing to middle schoolers.

There are two sequels to this book, which I really want to read! A Place to Come Back To (1984) is on Open Library, while The Love of Friends (1997) is available locally through inter-library loan. They're on my to-read list for later this year.